Bad Boys
by LucretiaDecoy
Summary: Sort-of prequel to I Want You Bad. Based around Mars and Kevin Mask's time together in the DMP. A bit darker and rougher around the edges than my other Ultimate Muscle fics as it's about the DMP. (Repost of 2005 fic.)
1. Mine's is Bigger Than Yours!

**A/N:** This fic serves two purposes: one, it's a "sort of" prequel to _I Want You Bad_ , in that it's set in the same universe/timeline, and it fills in some of the gaps of my other UM fics. And two, according to the UM manga, Kevin Mask is Robin Mask's eldest son, meaning he has at least one younger brother.

 **Disclaimer:** I don't own any of the characters in this chapter except Edward.

* * *

 **Chapter 1 – Mine's is Bigger Than Yours!**

Kevin Mask felt a rush of adrenaline course through his chest as he strode through the underground network of caves, passing Chojins whose names were as infamous as they were legendary. Kevin was unsure if the rush of adrenaline he felt had been induced by excitement, pride or anticipation; or perhaps even all three.

What would the high and mighty Sir Robin Mask say if he could see his eldest son now? All those years Robin had invested in his sons, and he had failed them both miserably. Robin had always put Kevin down, always told him that "good enough is never good enough", and yet he had told his friends and fellow Muscle League Legends that Kevin would grow up to be the IWF's biggest star.

How wrong he was.

Kevin smirked to himself as he took in his surroundings. All around him he could see the very men his father had spent years keeping him away from: Doomsmane, Skulldozer and Sunshine, to name but a few. Kevin stole a quick glance at the logo on the black T-shirt he wore, his smirk widening. Kevin Mask, the eldest son of Muscle League Legend Robin Mask, was officially a member of the DMP.

"Where are we going?" Dial Bolic asked, as he walked along behind Kevin.

"I got something I gotta take care of," Pumpinator replied, without turning round or slowing down.

Pumpinator continued to lead the way, walking on through the endless warren of underground caves that made up the DMP headquarters. Kevin continued to follow him, with Dial Bolic at the rear. Neither Kevin nor Dial Bolic knew where Pumpinator was taking them or why; but he had insisted they go, and he had insisted that it was a matter of some urgency.

Kevin suspected it was some sort of induction ceremony to welcome him to the DMP. Or perhaps it was some sort of test or trial to decide if he was suitable to become a fully-fledged Devil Chojin. His father had told him often enough about the Hercules Factory that all Muscle League wrestlers had to graduate from, and Robin Mask had also told his son that the DMP had a similar training facility for new recruits, known simply as "The Academy".

Whatever it was, Kevin was not in the least fazed by it. The torturous physical and mental training his father had put him through all his life had, in his opinion at least, prepared him for anything that life could possibly throw his way. There was no training schedule too intense, no opponent too strong, no situation too complex, and no enemy too devious. Kevin Mask could handle them all.

Pumpinator finally turned off the main tunnel they had been walking down, marching into a room that opened out onto the face of the mountainside. Unlike the other caves and the tunnel they had just left, this room was not lit by any lanterns, and was not warmed by a fire. The only light in the cave came from the full moon, which shone a cool, pale blue light over the craggy interior of the cave. Kevin hesitated, causing Dial Bolic to almost walk right into his back. Something seemed very odd about this cave. The entire area was… Glowing.

Puminator had stopped walking, and he appeared to be staring at something by the mouth of the cave. Dial Bolic hung back by the tunnel, but Kevin walked up to Pumpinator's side, wafting a hand through the air, which he realised was glowing because there was some sort of smoke lining the air, which was dancing in the blue moonlight, distorting the images and shadows around them.

"Hey scarface, you owe me," Pumpinator called out.

Kevin wafted at the hazy air again, squinting at the mouth of the cave as he noticed the silhouette of someone sitting there.

"Look what I found!" Pumpinator continued. "The son of Robin Mask!"

The figure stood up, walking slowly towards them. As the light of the moon was behind him, Kevin could not make out the approaching man's features, other than the fact that his head seemed to come to a sharp point.

"Huh?" the man asked.

"This is Kevin Mask," Pumpinator said proudly, holding out his hands towards Kevin. "Robin Mask's eldest son!"

The other man began to walk around Kevin, looking him over critically as he went. Kevin turned his head to watch the other man, his eyes widening as he stepped into the light.

He was obviously a Devil Chojin, Kevin thought to himself, and he was obviously a high-ranking and well thought of Devil Chojin. He carried himself with an air of confidence that even the Pumpinator failed to match. He was dressed in a pink and red wrestling outfit, with a large red headdress, mounted onto which was a gold visor. Under each of his eyes he had a deep scar that ran over his cheekbones. Over his chest was the image of a black bat, over which the DMP logo was printed in yellow.

One hand hung loosely at his side as he walked around Kevin, and the other hovered by his face, supporting a homemade cigarette between his forefinger and index finger. He stopped next to Pumpinator, tilting his head as he met Kevin's eyes. Kevin straightened his back, trying to look taller and larger as he watched the Devil Chojin move his cigarette to his mouth and draw deeply on it.

"Kevin Mask, huh?" he asked, before blowing the smoke out sharply through his nostrils.

Kevin sniffed cautiously at the air, suppressing a cough as the sweet and sickly taste of the smoke caught at the back of his throat.

"Is that…?" he began, pointing at the cigarette in the other man's hand.

"Weed, yeah," he casually replied.

"Kevin's with me, Mars!" Pumpinator interrupted them. "I found him, and I brought him here, to the DMP!"

Mars turned to the Pumpinator, shrugging his shoulders casually.

"What do you want, a chocolate bone?" Mars asked sarcastically. "So you brought Kevin Mask to da DMP? Who cares?"

"You should!" Pumpinator retorted. "I brought Kevin here. The eldest son of Robin Mask."

"Uh-huh?" Mars echoed, waving a hand in the air to indicate Pumpinator should continue his explanation.

"Well, Kevin is Robin's eldest son!" Pumpinator continued. "He's twenty-one years old, he's a grown man!"

"So?" Mars asked, glancing at Kevin before turning back to Pumpinator.

"So mine's is bigger than yours, asshole!" Pumpinator sneered, leaning over Mars.

Mars stared blankly at Pumpinator for a few seconds, before spinning his cigarette around between his fingers and then lifting it up towards Pumpinator's face. Dial Bolic yelped and even Kevin Mask gasped as Mars pressed the lit end of the cigarette into Pumpinator's cheek, slowly twisting it back and forth, grinding it into the side of Pumpinator's face, causing it to hiss viciously.

Pumpinator clenched his teeth tightly together, his entire body stiffening as he fought the urge to cry out in pain. Mars grinned up at him, his fangs glinting in the moonlight. He opened his fingers, the stubbed out cigarette falling to the ground at their feet.

"Just count yourself lucky I'm in a good mood tonight, shoeboy!" Mars told him. "Cause you understand dat if I hadn't been in such a good mood, I'da made you eat dat."

Mars pointed down at the remains of his cigarette, causing an image of Pumpinator eating the ashen remains to briefly flit through Kevin's mind. Pumpinator touched a hand to the burn on his cheek, growling down at Mars.

"Get outta here, before I kick your ass!" Mars warned him.

"Come on, boys!" Pumpinator said, marching towards the exit. "Let's go!"

Dial Bolic gladly left the cave first, followed by the Pumpinator. Kevin began to follow after them, but Mars dropped a hand heavily onto Kevin's shoulder, gripping his fingers into Kevin's skin to halt his progress.

"You stay here wid me," Mars ordered.

Pumpinator paused in the doorway, looking back at Kevin and Mars.

"I thought I told you to get outta here, shoeboy!" Mars yelled at him.

Pumpinator muttered something indecipherable under his breath before disappearing from sight. Mars then walked around to stand in front of Kevin, lifting his hand from Kevin's shoulder.

"So you decided to join da DMP too, huh?" Mars asked him.

"Yes, that's right," Kevin replied, nodding his head.

"So what's your plan?" Mars asked, folding his arms over his chest. "Find da boy, den call your little Muscle League buddies to come rescue you?"

"What?" Kevin echoed.

"Y'know Mask, unlike shoeboy, I ain't stupid," Mars said darkly. "I know you're here for da kid. But lemme just tell you dis: if you want da kid, you gotta get past me first, capisce?"

"I don't know what you're talking about, Mars," Kevin said firmly. "I swear."

Mars paused, studying Kevin carefully.

"I'm talking about da time you ran away from home when you was fifteen," Mars began slowly.

"How do you know about that?" Kevin asked. "I don't remember the DMP being there."

"Dey wasn't," Mars replied. "It was just me. I went back to da Mask Estate while you and your dad and your robot was all gone."

"You went back to…"

Kevin slowly pieced together the information he had just been given.

"That was the same night my brother was kidnapped," he said quietly. "You…"

Mars grinned, shrugging his shoulders.

"Little bastard has been da bane of my life da last six years, but dere's somethin' so sweet about knowin' I turned a Muscle League Legend's little boy into a Devil Chojin," he said.

"Edward?" Kevin asked. "You kidnapped Edward?"

Mars nodded his head, his grin still present.

"And you took him here, to the DMP headquarters?" Kevin asked.

Again, Mars nodded his agreement.

"And you have turned him into a Devil Chojin?" Kevin asked.

"Yeah, why don't you go have yourself a little family reunion, huh?" Mars offered.

"A reunion? Edward is here? Now?"

Mars nodded his head again.

"Come on, I'll take you to him," Mars offered.

Kevin followed after Mars, who walked far too slow for his liking. His mind was racing; for six years, he had been convinced that Edward had been killed. He had always believed that if anyone had kidnapped Sir Robin Mask's youngest son, they would surely hold the boy for a ransom.

But to learn that Edward was still alive, and a member of the DMP, no less!

"How old is he now?" Kevin asked, as Mars slowly sauntered down the corridor.

"You don't even know how old your own brother is?" Mars asked, smirking at Kevin.

"I can't remember…" Kevin replied breathlessly. "He was… He was six years younger than me, so he must be fifteen, right?"

"Yeah, I guess dat sounds about right," Mars agreed.

"The same age I was when I ran away…" Kevin added quietly.

"In here, Mask," Mars said, turning into a small cave and beckoning for Kevin to follow him.

Inside the cave was a small wrestling ring, the sight of which made Kevin glad he wore an iron mask, for he had turned whiter than a ghost. The canvas mat of the ring had been replaced with a carpet of steel wool, and the rings ropes had been substituted with barbed wire. The steel corners of the ring and the ringposts were unpadded, exposing the cruel metal joins.

Inside the ring were four wrestlers, all dressed in nothing more than a pair of wrestling shorts. Their bare feet were ripped open from the ring mat, and their bare bodies were torn, bloodied and layered in sweat. To Kevin's horror, one of the men inside the ring was little more than a tall, lanky adolescent boy, dressed in a pair of dark blue wrestling shorts and a black iron mask.

"Edward…" Kevin whispered, taking another step towards the ring.

Kevin watched as his younger brother fought against the other three wrestlers, who all appeared to be attacking only Edward himself. Despite being much lighter and younger than his opponents, Edward seemed to be easily as strong as them and a much wiser tactician than they were. Kevin felt his bottom jaw drop as he watched his brother fight so viciously, even Robin Mask would have been forced to avert his eyes.

Edward grabbed two of his opponents by their hair, smacking their heads together. He then grabbed his third opponent by the hair, pulling him over to the barbed wire ring ropes. Kevin winced as Edward slammed the man's head down against the top line of barbed wire, and then dragged him all the way along to the corner.

Edward then released the man, turning to start another assault on the remaining two wrestlers.

"Hey, Eddie!" Mars called to him.

"Scarface!" Edward responded, spinning around to face him. "How many times must I tell you? My name is Edward!"

Edward marched over to the ring ropes, grabbing onto the top one and hoisting himself over it, landing outside of the ring. He wiped his bloodied hands on his bare thighs, seeming not to care that he had just intentionally torn open the skin on his palms.

"What do you want, scarface?" Edward sneered.

"I gotta present for ya, Eddie," Mars replied, pointing over his shoulder with his thumb.

Edwards turned his head to Kevin, leaping back in shock.

"Kevin?" he spat.

"Edward?" Kevin said, stepping towards him.

Edward's green eyes dropped to the DMP logo over his brother's chest.

"You joined the DMP?" he asked quietly.

"Yes," Kevin confirmed. "Edward, I had no idea you were here all this time!"

"No, and nor did you care that I have been here all this time!" Edward haughtily replied.

Kevin could not think of a suitable response, and so remained silent, looking his brother up and down repeatedly in disbelief.

"Yeah, all dis love is beautiful, but it's startin' to make me feel sick," Mars drawled. "Do you guys know whose bike dat is parked outside?"

"That's mine," Kevin replied.

"Really?" Mars asked. "Oh good. Den you can take in into town. I got some business I gotta take care of."

"Alright," Kevin agreed.

"What?" Edward echoed, glancing back and forth between Kevin and Mars. "Wait just a minute, you can't steal Mars from me too!"

Kevin shifted his eyes to Mars questioningly.

"Not now, Eddie," Mars warned the younger Mask.

"This isn't bloody fair!" Edward yelled. "All my life he took everything from me! Mars is my friend, you can't have him!"

Mars turned to Kevin, rolling his eyes and shaking his head in exasperation.

"Hey Eddie?" Mars said, turning back to Edward.

"What?" Edward asked.

"Shut-up!"

Mars lunged forwards, driving a fist into Edward's gut. Edward doubled over and staggered back, clutching at his abdomen. Mars straightened up, shaking his head at Edward before turning back to Kevin.

"Come on Mask, let's go," he said, slapping Kevin on the shoulder.

Kevin watched Mars leave the room before turning back to his brother. He watched Edward writhe in pain a little longer, before trying to look dignified as he spotted his older brother watching him.

"He was just messing about with me!" Edward called to Kevin in a choked voice. "He does it all the time! We're the best of mates! Unlike dad, Mars prefers me to you!"

"Hm," Kevin said thoughtfully. "And I thought I had issues."

Kevin turned his back on his younger brother and started after Mars, ignoring Edward as he shouted a string of insults after him.

* * *

 **Next Chapter:** Mars gives Kevin a crash course in how to behave like a Devil Chojin. **Chapter 2 – Welcome to the DMP**.


	2. Welcome to the DMP

**Disclaimer:** I only partially own Edward (since I created him from the concept of Kevin having a/some younger brother(s) in the first place) and I totally own Amy. Everyone else belongs to Yudetamago.

 **Recap:** Upon arriving at the DMP headquarters for the first time, Kevin Mask met Mars and discovered that his younger brother Edward, who had been missing for six years, has been in training as a Devil Chojin.

* * *

 **Chapter 2 – Welcome to the DMP**

Mars opened out his arms and threw back his head, closing his eyes against the wind. Kevin was already riding along the road at a speed above the legal limit, and it felt to Mars as though they were accelerating further; but Mars did not care.

"I'd feel a lot happier if you sat back down, Mars," Kevin shouted to him.

"Ah, shut-up and loosen up, Mask!" Mars shot back.

"What will happen to you if I go round a corner, hm?" Kevin asked.

Mars ignored Kevin's question. He was gripping the backseat of the bike between his knees, and he felt that was sufficient grip to hold him in place should Kevin decide to turn off the main road.

"Say Mask, are you hungry?" he shouted to Kevin.

"No," Kevin plainly replied.

"Huh?"

"I said no."

"How can you not be hungry?"

"Hunger is a weakness."

"Ah damn, you're not another one of dose disciplinarians, are ya Mask?"

"I'm a Chojin warrior, and I–"

"And you need to learn to loosen up a bit. I thought you joined da DMP to get away from your dad."

"I did."

"So do somethin' he never would've let you do. Eat somethin'."

"Alright then. Where shall we go?"

"High Park Ladies' Club."

Mars swayed forwards, almost falling over Kevin's head as the bike slowed beneath him. His arms flailed at his sides as he struggled to steady himself, his heart skipping a beat as he finally righted himself.

"Hey, what was dat for?" he yelled at Kevin.

"High Park Ladies' Club?" Kevin repeated.

"Yeah, dat's what I said!" Mars confirmed. "Just take a left, den a right, den–"

"I know where High Park Ladies' Club is. I just thought that… Well… Isn't High Park Ladies' Club a… A ladies' club?"

"Oddly enough, yeah, it is."

"Well, we're not exactly ladies, are we?"

"No, but you're English and I'm sexy."

"What?"

"Trust me."

Kevin gripped tighter onto the handlebars of his motorbike.

"I'm not sure I like the sound of this…" he said slowly.

"Just follow my lead, and you'll be fine," Mars assured him. "Just imagine dat dis is like a lesson."

"A lesson?"

"Yeah. It's DMP 101."

Kevin slowly nodded his head, following Mars's directions and turning left off of the main road. Behind him Mars was still standing with his arms spread wide and his eyes closed. Kevin tried to guess what Mars's plans were for when they arrived at the club; it was a club exclusively for women – wealthy women at that – and in Kevin's mind, the only foreseeable way that the two of them could possible gain access to the building would be for them to dress up as women themselves.

Kevin gulped at the very thought, turning right, passing a sign that informed him he was entering the ground of High Park Ladies' Club. He slowed gradually as he neared the front entrance, which was guarded by two bulky men in dark suits.

"And now what do we do?" Kevin asked, drawing to a halt as he parked his bike at the very top of the carpark.

"Now we just play it cool," Mars calmly replied as he leapt off the bike.

Kevin slowly followed Mars at a distance as the Devil Chojin sauntered towards the entrance of the club, where, unsurprisingly, the two suited men side-stepped over the doorway, glaring down at Mars ominously.

"What do you want?" one of them asked him.

"What does it look like, huh?" Mars asked, waving a hand up and down the length of himself and then turning to wave a hand at Kevin. "We're da entertainment. It's Elizabeth's fortieth birthday, and it's meant to be a surprise, so no tellin' da other ladies, yeah?"

The two men turned to each other, exchanging looks of confusion.

"Well, I guess it explains why they're dressed so weird," the first one said.

"I'm gonna let you two in," the second one said, turning to Mars again. "But at the first sign of trouble, I'll be calling the police, understand?"

"Absolutely, my friend," Mars said, saluting the man.

The two men side-stepped back to their original positions, and Mars gladly walked past them, through the doorway. He took three steps into the hallway before pausing to look over his shoulder at Kevin, who was still loitering outside.

"C'mon, Mask!" he called to Kevin. "Let's go!"

Kevin took a deep breath, eying each of the doormen in turn, and then strode after Mars.

"You ever been here before, Mask?" Mars asked as Kevin joined him.

"Well, no, actually," Kevin sarcastically replied. "What with me being a man, and all."

"Pity," Mars sighed, grabbing a vol au vent from the tray of a passing waiter.

Kevin screwed up his face as he eyed at the back of Mars's head, but his actions went unnoticed, since Mars could not see him, and since Kevin's mask hide all but his most extreme facial expressions anyway.

"Here we are," Mars said slyly, as they stepped into a large dancehall. "Now you just keep your yap shut and do what I do. Don't talk unless I tell ya to, you got it?"

"I don't think I will find that too hard to do," Kevin agreed, looking around the hall full of exquisitely dressed women. "Considering I still have no idea what we are doing here in the first place."

"At da DMP, we get sex, not money," Mars plainly replied, before walking off towards the centre of the room.

Kevin remained frozen on the spot, his chin clanging against the interior of his iron mask as his bottom jaw fell open. He watched Mars approach a group of middle-aged women, drawing their attention to him. Kevin slowly walked towards Mars, studying the Devil Chojin's every move and listening carefully to every word he said.

"Lovely evening, isn't it ladies?" Mars asked them.

They all nodded their heads in agreement, eying him warily.

"And just who might you be?" one of them asked him.

"I'm the entertainment for tonight, ladies," Mars replied, forcing on an accent that was not his own, but one which made him sound more like those around him. "My name is Alessandro, and I'm a Magician."

"A Magician?" one woman echoed, curling her lip at him in disgust.

"Yes, I perform magic tricks," Mars confirmed. "But I think that you are a non-believer, ma'am. Here, allow me to show you something which might just change your mind."

Kevin walked around the group, keeping a short distance between himself and Mars. He sensed that what Mars was about to do would be more like larceny than magic, but Mars had managed to captivate even Kevin Mask's attention with his performance, and Kevin still wondered exactly what was about to happen next.

Mars slid his index and middle fingers into his belt, pulling out what looked like a small black wallet. He held it up between his two fingers, waving it around for the group to see. He briefly glanced at Kevin, his smirk deepening as they locked eyes. Mars opened the wallet to reveal that it contained some playing cards.

"I need a hot volunteer for this trick, ladies," he said, looking around the women in front of him.

Despite the fact that a couple of the women readily volunteered themselves to him, Mars chose the oldest woman of the group, again glancing at Kevin slyly.

"Now you see here I have the nine of spades," Mars said, pulling a card from the wallet and showing it to the group. "What I want you to do for me is to make the pattern on this side of the card move to this side of the card."

Mars turned the card over to show the women the red patterned back of the card.

"I can't do that," the woman said, shaking her head.

"You can," Mars assured her. "If you could just turn that way for me please."

Mars pointed at Kevin, and the woman turned her back on Mars, facing in Kevin's direction. Kevin stopped short, folding his arms expectantly as he watched Mars at work. Mars reached one hand down, taking hold of the woman's wrist. He lifted her hand up and out in front of her and then pressed the card into the palm of her hand with his other hand. He then took hold of her other wrist and lifted it up, pressing her two hands together.

"Now I just need you to hold onto that one for just a moment for me," Mars said, shifting his eyes to Kevin.

Kevin watched on in horror as Mars slid his hands down the woman's arms, his fingers nimbly removing her gold watch from one wrist and her diamond bracelet from the other. Mars slipped both items into his belt and then eased off the woman's necklace, dropping that into his belt too.

"Now if you could just open your hands and tell me what you see," he said to the woman.

She opened her hands apart, gasping as she saw that the face of the card was now completely blank and the numbers and symbols were now on the back, imprinted over the red pattern of the card. The other women in the group applauded Mars's performance appreciatively; but Kevin suddenly felt nauseous.

"And for my next trick, I will need a volunteer who has a real eye for detail," Mars said, looking round the group again.

Kevin sighed when Mars selected the woman who was wearing the most jewellery, and began his next trick. No longer able to watch for sheer anxiety's sake, Kevin turned his back on Mars, almost bumping into someone.

"Sorry!" he said quickly.

"Well try watching where you're going next time!" a voice snapped back.

Kevin faltered, completely taken aback by the confidence of the woman in front of him. She was one of the catering staff, dressed in the same black and white ensemble as the male catering staff. Kevin slowly eyed her over, unsure as to exactly why she was still standing so close to him. Her lips were pursed and her eyes narrowed, making her look thoroughly angered by everything around her. She was holding her silver tray of hors d'oeuvres up at her shoulders, aiming it at Kevin.

"I said, would you like a snack, Sir?" she snarled.

"What?" Kevin echoed, eying her over again.

"Are you deaf or something?" she snapped irritably. "Look, do you want a crab puff or not?"

Kevin looked down at the tray she was pushing towards him, which was stacked with a pyramid of seafood snacks.

"Oh, no thank you," he said, looking up at her face again.

She sighed, shaking her head to herself.

"See you bloody strippers, you're more bother than your worth!" she grumbled. "Just for a laugh, tell me, is "knight in biker gear" your usual gimmick, or was it a special request?"

"What?" Kevin yelped.

"Well anyway, I'm sure you getting your kit off should be more entertaining than the Magician some idiot hired tonight," she continued, nodding her head in Mars's direction. "He's about as much good as a chocolate fireman."

Kevin hesitated, working through what she had just said in his mind. He had just realised that she was being sarcastic and that she was assuming he was a stripper, hired to perform there that night, when she walked off again, approaching others with her tray of finger food.

"Pf, women," he grumbled, turning back to watch Mars's performance.

Kevin was relieved to see that Mars was walking towards him, obviously finished conning the rich ladies.

"You're nothing more than a common thief, you do realise that?" Kevin asked Mars as he joined him.

"Hey, it ain't my fault da DMP don't pay big bucks like da Muscle League do," Mars replied. "And a guy's gotta eat, right? Hey you! Yeah, you! Da girl who looks like a horse! Bring dat tray of yours over here, yeah?"

Kevin peered over Mars's shoulder, cringing as he saw the woman who had been trying to force snacks onto him only moments ago strutting towards them, scowling at Mars.

"Would Sir like a crab puff?" she asked, jabbing her tray against Mars's arm.

Mars turned towards the tray, smacking a hand down onto it as he grinned at the waitress. He grabbed up a handful of the little snacks and then shoved them all into his mouth at once. Kevin felt a cold rush of panic wash over him as he saw the girl's face twist into an expression of shock. Mars grinned through his mouthful of food, wrongly interpreting her wide-eyed expression as being a look of disgust; but Kevin knew it was not Mars's lack of social graces that had shocked the girl. She was not looking at Mars's crab-paste smeared face; she was looking at his chest. More specifically, she was looking at the DMP logo on his chest.

"You're from the DMP?" she asked, lifting her eyes to Mars's.

Mars slowly stopped chewing, swallowing the contents of his mouth in one big gulp.

"Yeah," he said slowly. "Dat's da Dynamic Magic People. I'm da top Magician at da DMP."

"Dynamic Magic People my arse, you're from the DMP!" she yelled. "The Demon Making Plant!"

Kevin turned sharply to Mars as those around them fell silent, all turning to see what the commotion was about. Kevin expected to see Mars panicking or at least running away; but he was simply standing perfectly still, eying the waitress as though she had just gone completely mad.

"What did you just say?" he asked her.

"I said you're from the Demon Making Plant!" she yelled, jabbing an accusing finger at the logo on his chest.

"The what?" he asked.

"The Demon Making Plant!"

"Amy!" one of the waiter's shouted, hurrying over to the waitress. "Amy, what are you doing?"

"These two are Devil Chojins from the DMP!" she told him, pointing a finger at Mars and Kevin.

The waiter turned to Mars and Kevin, forcing out laughter.

"I'm terribly sorry, Sirs," he said. "She's new here, and little highly strung. An exchange student from England, no doubt sent here because she's a complete psycho!"

"I'm not from England and I'm not a psycho!" Amy yelled.

"I am sorry gentlemen, please excuse us!" the waiter said, nodding his head first at Mars and then at Kevin.

"No problem, just don't let it happen again, yeah?" Mars said. "Maybe you oughta fire her sorry ass."

"Yes, thank you, Sir. Please enjoy the rest of your evening."

"No!" Amy cried, dropped her tray as the waiter grabbed her forcefully and shoved her back from Mars and Kevin.

Kevin watched the waiter shove Amy all the way out of the dancehall before turning to Mars, who was in the process of sucking crab paste from his fingers.

"That was a bit harsh, wasn't it?" he asked in a low voice.

"Crazy bitch was getting' on my nerves," Mars plainly replied.

Kevin sighed, readying himself to argue the point further, but stopping as Mars became distracted by something. Two women walked past them, followed by a young girl carrying a large lollipop. Mars bent over and plucked the red candy from the girl's hand, ramming it into his mouth before straightening up again next to Kevin. The girl blinked up at Mars in sheer disbelief. Mars watched her from the corner of his eye as he slowly slid the lollipop out of his mouth again.

"Beat it, ya little bastard!" he yelled at her.

She raced off after the two women, too frightened to admit to anyone else that the big scary man had just stolen her lollipop.

"You evil, twisted fucktard," Kevin growled, as Mars sucked on the lollipop.

Mars turned to Kevin, grinning as he pulled his belt forwards, revealing to Kevin the multitude of valuables he had successfully stolen.

"I thought you said we were going for something to eat?" Kevin asked him.

"Yeah, but we ain't got no money," Mars pointed out. "But now dat we do, we don't need to stay here no more. Let's go find a restaurant, yeah?"

"A restaurant that accepts jewellery as payment?" Kevin asked sarcastically as they started across the hall towards the door.

"No, dumbass, we gotta go change all dis crap for cash first, obviously!" Mars drawled. "But den we can go blow it all on food."

"Blow it all on food? Mars, you'll have enough money there to feed the entire DMP for a week!"

"Or enough money to feed two members of da DMP for one night at da best restaurant in town."

Mars winked at Kevin, stepping back outside. Kevin followed after him, shaking his head.

"What can I say, Mask, I got expensive taste," Mars added, before sucking at the lollipop again. "Dis tastes like crap, do you want it?"

Mars held the lollipop out towards Kevin, who shook his head vigorously.

"No thank you," he said.

"I hate candy," Mars grumbled, chucking the sticky lollipop onto the windscreen of a nearby Mercedes.

"You hate candy?" Kevin repeated. "So then why did you steal that lollipop from that child?"

Mars shrugged his shoulders.

"Because I can," he replied, as though it was the most obvious answer in the world.

"But that was just downright heartless and despicable," Kevin sneered.

"Yeah it was," Mars said, cocking a half-grin at Kevin.

"Yes, it was cruel and malicious!" Kevin added.

"Hey Mask?"

"Yes?"

"Welcome to da DMP."

* * *

 **Next Chapter:** Mars and Kevin dine out, but not all goes according to plan when their evening is interrupted by a trio of DMP members intent on spoiling their fun. **Chapter 3 – Just a Girl**.


	3. Just a Girl

**A/N:** Smell the irony in everything Mars and Kevin say…

 **Disclaimer:** I still own nowt but Edward and Amy.

 **Recap:** Mars taught Kevin how a Devil Chojin acquires cash and the two met an angry woman called Amy.

* * *

 **Chapter 3 – Just a Girl**

Kevin had been fortunate enough to grow up in a wealthy family. Not only had the money he earned in the Muscle League made Robin Mask a rich man, but the endorsements he got from various institutions, the advertising deals, the knighthood and all its associated pleasantries and the Mask family fortune he had inherited from his father, Robin Grande, meant that Robin and Alice Mask had been in possession of a bank account that most Hollywood celebrities could only ever dream of owning. As a result of this, Kevin and Edward had been brought up in what might seem to some as a luxurious lifestyle; had it not been for the intense and unrelenting torturous training sessions their father had inflicted upon them from the age of three.

One of Kevin's favourite past-times as a child had been dinner theatre. Perhaps he had enjoyed it so much because his mother had, and Kevin had always been so much closer to his mother than he had to his father. Whatever the reason for Kevin's preferences was, the combination of good food and live entertainment had always brought a smile to his face.

Until now.

"Geddoffa dat!" Mars yelled, grabbing a man by the throat and tossing him aside. "Dese people can be like sharks, you gotta fight for what you want, Mask. Don't let nobody push you around. You see somethin' you like, you gotta just take it, yeah?"

Kevin looked down at the mountain of food Mars had piled onto his plate, before moving his eyes to his own plate, which was empty, and still as clean as when he had first collected it. In one hand he held an untouched chicken satay stick, and in the other he held a plastic cup filled with beer.

"Are you gonna eat dat?" Mars asked him, pointing at the small stick of meat in his hand.

Kevin looked up and down the length of the buffet table, and around himself at the carnage Mars had left as he had shoved people and furniture alike aside in order to satisfy his own appetite. Kevin's eyes finally rested on Mars's plate, onto which Mars had piled a sixteen ounce steak, five chicken legs, two pork chops, a mound of grey, slimy, indeterminable seafood, a whole squid, a tuna steak and three helpings of sushi.

"No, you have it," Kevin dryly replied as he handed his small stick of chicken to Mars. "And here, while you're at it, you'd better take some of these too."

Kevin grabbed up some corn on the cob, squashing them down onto the top of Mars's culinary mountain.

"It looks like you have every other food group known to man on that plate, I thought you might like some vegetables to finish it off with," Kevin sarcastically explained, as Mars frowned up at him questioningly.

"You're absolutely right, Mask!" Mars said, nodding his head. "Hey you! Get your stinkin' hands offa dat!"

Kevin sighed as Mars grabbed a man by the elbow, ripping him back from the table and effortlessly flinging him across the room in order to gain access to the vegetable platter.

"Mars?" Kevin began, as Mars growled at a woman approaching the table until she screamed and ran away.

"Yeah?" Mars asked, picking up an apple and biting into it.

"Pumpinator told that we have to keep a low profile," Kevin continued, as Mars tossed the half-eaten apple back into the fruit bowl.

"Yeah, cause nobody knows dat da DMP is still dere," Mars replied. "Everybody thinks da Muscle League wiped da DMP out like 28 years ago. We gotta keep it a secret until we get da signal from HQ to attack da IWF."

"We have to keep it a secret, you say?" Kevin asked, looking down at his own DMP T-shirt.

"Yeah, dat's right," Mars confirmed, turning to face Kevin.

"Hm."

Kevin looked up at the large DMP logo splashed over Mars's chest, which he was making no effort to conceal from the other diners in the buffet restaurant.

"Right…" Kevin said slowly.

"But it's okay, you don't have to worry too much about hidin' yourself," Mars assured him. "Cause it's been so long since King Muscle, your dad and da other Muscle League losers defeated da DMP, most people have forgotten all about us. And da new generation don't know nothin' about us. It's been nearly thirty years since anybody saw a Devil Chojin. Just relax, yeah?"

"That's true, it has been nearly thirty years, and, generally speaking, people are either too young to remember the DMP, or have just forgotten all about the DMP with time," Kevin said. "But what about that girl back at High Park? She knew exactly who we were!"

"Ah, she was just a girl, what are you worryin' for?"

"But what if she was part of the Muscle League?"

"Part of da Muscle League? Mask, she was a girl, not a wrestler. She was just a girl. Forget about her already. Dere ain't a woman in dis universe worth worryin' about. You won't never catch me gettin' all worked up over some girl. Women are only good for one thing, Mask, remember dat."

Kevin sighed, touching a hand to the part of his mask that covered his forehead. As much as he wanted to just forget about the girl, he was unable to shake her from his mind. Whilst she had quite obviously not been a Chojin, he had no proof that she was not somehow linked to the Muscle League; she could have been Terry Man's daughter, or Buffaloman's niece. Or, worst of all, she could even be a direct relative of King Muscle himself.

"Besides, what does it matter if she is in da Muscle League?" Mars asked as he rejoined Kevin. "If it bothers you dat much, just take her out, yeah?"

"What?" Kevin echoed, dropping his cup of beer in shock.

"Take her out, yeah?" Mars pressed, lifting his foot back as Kevin's beer spilled over the floor.

"Take her out?" Kevin repeated. "But… I'm not… I don't… That is, I mean to say that… I don't want to date the girl–"

"I wasn't talking about you takin' her out on a date, Mask! I meant take her out. You know, take her out? Kill her?"

"Oh, kill her! Of course, yes! Take her out on a date, the very thought!"

Kevin forced laughter, waving a hand at Mars.

"You are a funny man, Mars!" he added.

"Yeah, right…" Mars muttered, eying Kevin over.

Mars began to casually eat at the food on his plate, hissing and growling at anyone else who came anywhere near him as he slowly made his way over to the window. Kevin scanned the table one last time, still unable to bring himself to eat freely when the money he was paying for the food with was stolen.

Mars placed his plate onto the windowledge, leaning over it to look out the window. He looked up and down the street as though he was expecting to see something approaching from one direction or the other.

"So you'll be doin' your trainin' at da Academy soon, huh?" Mars asked Kevin as he joined him.

"I don't know," Kevin replied. "No-one mentioned any "Academy" to me."

"Dey made me go twice," Mars continued. "I passed both times, but dey didn't want to admit I was good enough, so dey failed me anyway."

"They failed you?"

"It wasn't so bad da second time, but da first time, dey…"

Mars trailed off, eying Kevin over suspiciously. He took a bite out of one of the chicken legs, chewing thoughtfully as he studied Kevin.

"So what exactly does one do at "The Academy"?" Kevin asked him.

"You gotta pass all da tests da DMP set for you," Mars replied through a mouthful of food. "But don't worry, da tests are easy for guys like you and me, yeah?"

"What sort of tests is there?"

Mars sank his teeth into the chicken leg again, starting to tear the meat from the bone, but freezing suddenly. Kevin frowned in confusion, as the only part of Mars that was still moving was his eyes. Kevin watched as Mars's golden eyes slowly moved from Kevin's right shoulder, past his head and over his left shoulder. When Mars remained frozen on the spot, Kevin turned in the direction his eyes appeared to have stopped, tilting his head in confusion at what he saw.

Mars appeared to be looking at the woman who had just walked in to the restaurant. There was nothing extraordinary about her, Kevin thought to himself as he watched her engage the cashier in conversation. She was slightly taller than average, but otherwise she was just a girl.

Kevin turned back to Mars, who was chewing on the chicken meat through a wide grin. He tossed the bone over his shoulder and walked past Kevin, heading directly towards the girl at the counter. Kevin watched as she ended her conversation with the cashier, turning around and bumping into Mars's shoulder. She let out a cry of surprise, staggering back from him. She started to apologise for her error, but stopped abruptly, running her eyes quickly over Mars.

"Not you again!" she snarled.

"Hey sweetheart, was you lookin' for a job?" Mars asked, pointing over the counter at the waiting staff.

"Yeah, since some arsehole just got me fired from High Park!" she yelled back at him.

"Oh God…" Kevin groaned.

"I know you're a Devil Chojin!" she continued.

"So are you needin' money, sweetheart?" Mars asked her, reaching a hand into his belt and pulling out a handful of notes.

"Yeah, but I don't want any of your dirty DMP money!" she argued back.

"We was just on our way to da Palace," Mars said, slowing dragging a finger over the tops of the notes in his hand. "I could make it worth your while if you wanna join us? What do ya say, sweetheart?"

"I say I'd rather die, slowly and painfully!" she replied, slapping a hand at Mars's hands, knocking the money from his grasp.

As the notes frittered around Mars, the girl marched away from him, only pausing to scowl at Kevin before marching right out of the restaurant.

"You was right about her, Mask," Mars said with a sigh, kicking at the piles of money around his feet. "She's too much like a good girl to be any fun."

"I never said that," Kevin pointed out.

"So why don't we just finish up eatin', and go book ourselves into da Palace for tonight, yeah?" Mars asked, abandoning the money he had dropped to rejoin Kevin.

"The Palace?" Kevin repeated questioningly.

"Yeah, it's a place where guys like you and me like to go sometimes, capisce?"

"Not really."

Kevin suspected that he should be concerned; but Mars turned his back on him and continued his act of gluttony as he worked his way through the inconceivable mountain of food he had bought. In the back of his mind, Kevin was certain he had heard of "The Palace" somewhere before, but, try as might, he simply could not remember where.

Shaking his head in an attempt to shake the thought from his mind, Kevin turned his attention to the window, looking beyond Mars up the street outside. Kevin let out a small sigh as he sighted three large figures marching moodily down the street towards them, shoving people out of their way as they went. If the DMP were meant to be keeping a low profile, Kevin thought to himself, they were certainly all in breach of conduct that night.

"My brother's on his way here with two friends," Kevin said in a low voice, shifting his eyes from the trio to Mars.

Mars shrugged his shoulders, grabbing up a handful of the grey mush and ramming it into his mouth. Kevin curled his lip in disgust, glad that his mask hid the fact that his face had just turned an interesting shade of green.

The door of the restaurant burst open, and the occupants within the restaurant screamed in shock as Edward Mask marched in, followed closely by two other wrestlers in DMP shirts.

"I thought I might find you both here!" Edward yelled, pointing a finger at Kevin and Mars.

Mars slowly turned around to face the trio, eying them over in vague amusement.

"I'm the only one who eats here with Mars!" Edward added, waggling his gloved finger at Kevin.

Mars swung one arm back, almost winding Kevin with his plate.

"Take dis for a minute, would ya Mask?" he said quietly.

Kevin numbly took hold of the plate in both hands, watching on as Mars sucked the food from each of his fingers in turn before striding up to Edward. Mars shoved out both hands, his hands flying past either side of Edward's head and colliding with each of his friends, shoving them both back. One stumbled back into a group of people, the other fell over a nearby chair, crashing to the ground in an ungraceful heap.

Mars took his hands back, grabbing the spike on top of Edward's mask with one hand and knocking on the side of the black iron helmet with his other hand.

"What's wrong wid you, huh?" he yelled into Edward's face.

"Alright, that's enough!" Kevin said, putting down Mars's plate and walking over to join them. "Let him go," he said to Mars.

"Little bastard has head problems, y'know?" Mars told Kevin, before vigorously knocking on Edward's helmet again. "Ain't dat right, Eddie?"

"Stop it!" Kevin barked, grabbing Mars's wrist.

Mars froze, his hand hovering over Edward's head. He slowly moved his eyes to Kevin, his lips thinning as their eyes met. He then moved his eyes to Kevin's hand, which was still gripped tightly around his wrist.

"He's just a kid, leave him alone," Kevin said quietly.

"I am not a child, Kevin!" Edward wailed, kicking out a booted foot at his older brother.

Kevin swiftly stepped out of Edward's reach, releasing Mars's wrist as he did so.

"Go home, kid," Mars said, roughly releasing the spike of Edward's helmet.

"I don't know why you want to be friends with Kevin anyway," Edward sneered, as his two friends rejoined him. "He's nothing but a liar and a scoundrel!"

Mars turned to Kevin, cocking a smirk at him. Kevin shook his head in despair, turning his back on his fellow DMP cohorts.

"We're all lyin' scoundrels at da DMP, Eddie," Mars pointed out.

"For the last time, scarface, my name is Edward–"

"And I already told you not to call me scarface."

"So stop calling me Eddie!"

Mars sighed, dragging a hand down over his face.

"Look, get outta my sight, kid," he began, his impatience creeping into his tone. "I already told ya to stop bein' so damn clingy!"

"It's always been the same, all my life, Kevin always took everything from me!" Edward screamed. "I hate you, you're no brother of mine!"

Edward turned to Kevin with his last remark, shoving Kevin back with both hands. Edward's two friends started towards Kevin, but Mars quickly leapt in, gladly knocking them both down again with a double clothesline. The customers and staff who had not already done so fled the restaurant as Edward threw himself at Kevin, who caught him awkwardly, falling backwards through a table.

"I'm going to kill you!" Edward growled. "The DMP is only big enough for one Mask, and I got there first!"

Edward aimed a punch at Kevin's gut, but Kevin quickly rolled out of the way, rolling to his feet and staggering back. Edward began to get to his feet, and Kevin squatted down into a defensive position, readying himself for his younger brother's attack. Kevin thought he was prepared for what may happen next, but Kevin forgot that he was with Mars.

Kevin's hands lowered and his legs straightened as his eyes landed on Mars, who was holding his plate of food in one hand, scooping the food into his mouth with the other hand, and warding off Edward's two friends with a series of strategic kicks and stomps. Kevin was so amazed by Mars's finesse, he failed to notice his irate and bitter younger brother flying through the air towards him.

Kevin groaned loudly in shock and pain as Edward speared him full force, knocking him onto his back again. Taking one last glance at Mars as he sucked more of the foul grey mush from his fingers whilst fighting off two Devil Chojins, Kevin came to the conclusion that his brother was probably not as formidable an opponent as he had at first assumed he would be.

Kevin grabbed Edward by the shoulders and rolled over, pinning Edward down under him.

"Let go of me!" Edward wailed, wriggling beneath Kevin's grip.

"I won't fight you, Edward," Kevin said softly. "So just give it up."

"You will fight me!" Edward argued back. "And I'll beat you!"

"Ah, shut-up!" Mars yelled, tipping his plate over Edward's head.

Kevin slowly stood up from Edward as the younger Mask rolled over clawing at the soggy food remains seeping into his mask. Kevin watched his brother writhe in frustrated fury before surveying his surroundings. Edward's two friends were crawling around on the floor nursing their wounds, hiding themselves amidst the shattered tables and chairs around them. Kevin looked up at Mars, but Mars appeared to be distracted by something.

Kevin watched with perverse interest as Mars pulled a lighter from his belt, walking over to a giant potted plant by one window. Mars squirted something from a nearby table onto the plant, before flicking on the lighter, and moving the flame under one of the giant leaves of the plant.

As the plant erupted in flames, Mars grinned at Kevin, slipping the lighter back into his belt and then pretending to warm his hands on the fire.

"Uh, Mars?" Kevin said, pointing as a chunk of the plant fell to the ground, igniting a scattered tablecloth.

"Heh, I always did like a good fire," Mars said with a shrug of his shoulders. "Come on Mask, let's get to da Palace early, dat way we get da best of da best."

Kevin stepped over Edward as he moaned and groaned to himself on the floor, continuing on towards the door, where Mars was waiting for him. As the two walked down the street, three police cars passed them, followed shortly afterwards by a fire engine.

"Larceny and arson," Kevin said as they walked slowly away from the chaos behind them. "What other crimes did you have in mind for tonight, Mars?"

"Ah nothing much, Mask," Mars casually replied. "Just a bit of solicitation at da Palace, yeah?"

Kevin eyed Mars suspiciously as they rounded a corner, watching the Devil Chojin as he grinned proudly, walking through the door of the next building. Kevin took a step back looking up at the building Mars had disappeared into.

It was just another four-storey building like all the others around it only it had the addition of two artificial turrets built onto the front corners of the roof, between which hung a huge neon sign reading "The Palace".

"Ah, now I remember…" Kevin muttered to himself. "The Palace is one of "those" hotels…"

Kevin walked on, disappearing into the hotel after Mars.

* * *

 **Next Chapter:** Mars continues educating Kevin in the ways of the DMP by taking him to a hotel of ill repute and telling him some of the darker secrets of the inner workings of the Demon Making Plant. **Chapter 4 – Bad Boys**.


	4. Bad Boys

**Disclaimer:** I only own the crybaby and the moody bitch. Everyone else belongs to Yudetamago.

 **Recap:** Mars took Kevin to a buffet restaurant, but the meal ended in disaster when Edward Mask and two of his DMP friends attacked Mars and Kevin.

* * *

 **Chapter 4 – Bad Boys**

Kevin slowly turned on the spot, taking in his surroundings. He cleared his throat awkwardly, an instinctual action he often performed when he felt nervous or anxious about something.

"Just a quick question, Mars," he began, trying to chose his words as tactfully as he possibly could.

"Shoot," Mars replied.

"Well, you have plenty of money there," Kevin continued. "And whilst the rooms here at The Palace are horrendously expensive for some unknown reason, you did still have enough money for us to have a room each."

"Nah," Mars said, shaking his head. "Dat's just a waste of money."

"So we have to share a room?" Kevin asked, leaning past Mars to eye the king-size bed behind him, layered with red satin sheets.

"Well, it ain't like we need an extra bed, we ain't gonna be sleepin'," Mars said, eying Kevin as though he were stupid.

"We're not?" Kevin yelped, locking his eyes onto Mars's. "Ah. I rather think that we have had our wires crossed, Mars. I know that the DMP is very much a man's organisation, and it's a sort of "all lads together" type of atmosphere, but I'm not really that way inclined, I'm afraid."

"Huh?"

Kevin gulped and then cleared his throat again. Mars looked angry.

"I prefer women," he said quietly.

"Well good!" Mars said, frowning harder at Kevin. "Cause dey don't supply men here!"

"They don't supply…?"

Kevin looked around himself again, sweating beneath his mask as the realisation of his situation finally occurred to him.

"This is a brothel," he concluded, turning back to Mars.

"It's a whorehouse, yeah!" Mars agreed. "What did you think it was, huh?"

"Oh, well, I thought that it was just one of those sleazy motels and that you…"

Kevin slowly stopped, the angered and irritated look on Mars's face telling him that now was not the best time to tell Mars what he had really thought. Kevin sensed that Mars would not take too kindly to hearing Kevin tell him how he had assumed that Mars had booked the room for the two of them to be alone together.

"You might wanna take dat mask off, Mask," Mars added. "Cause da bitches will be here soon, yeah?"

Kevin slowly nodded his head, still feeling too stupid to talk. Mars walked over to the bed and began pulling the sheets off, allowing Kevin the opportunity to quietly sigh in relief.

* * *

Kevin lingered awkwardly by the window. Mars was happily sitting on the floor, slouched against the end of the bed, surrounded by scantily-clad women who were readily obeying any orders he gave, from pouring him another glass of champagne to feeding him; although Kevin did wonder how Mars could possibly have room in his stomach for any more food after what he had consumed in the restaurant earlier.

Kevin had never actually been with a prostitute, and had not wanted to admit as much to Mars, who seemed to see the practise as a perfectly ordinary, everyday activity. Kevin had often wondered what it would be like to be with a prostitute, and indeed what it would be like to be inside a brothel; but now that he was confronted with both, Kevin was rather alarmed to find that his reaction was not at all what he had expected it to be.

Unlike Mars, Kevin really found no pleasure in what was going on all around him.

"We're out of champagne," one girl said.

"Call room service!" Mars ordered.

One woman started towards the telephone, but Kevin quickly leapt forwards.

"No!" he said, holding up a hand to stop her. "Let me go downstairs for it myself," he continued. "At least that way we can be sure they don't… Give us the crap stuff…"

Mars pulled a face at Kevin, but Kevin ignored him, hurrying out of the room. Kevin was relieved to close the room door behind himself, and walked down to the main hall a little quicker than he had intended to.

Looking around, Kevin could not find any staff members. He continued down the hall towards the reception desk, where he could see one lone figure sat by a computer screen. The corridor Kevin was walking along was poorly lit, and the reception area seemed unnaturally bright by comparison. As he neared the edge of the darkened corridor, Kevin skidded to a halt, turning his head to the front door as someone walked briskly in. Taking one step back to completely conceal himself in the shadows, Kevin watched in amusement as the woman walked straight up to the front desk.

"Hi there, I was just wondering if you had any vacancies?" she asked the woman behind the desk.

As the two began talking, Kevin found himself grinning. As unlikely as it seemed, this was the same girl who had recognised the DMP logo on his T-shirt at High Park Ladies' Club. She had changed her clothing again, this time dressing herself in a pair of stiletto heels, a short skirt, a basque top and a short black leather jacket. Her dark hair was still scraped back from her face and tied up on top of her head, and she still looked as irritable and temperamental as she had both at High Park Ladies Club and at the restaurant.

"Look, I don't want to work here as a whore," she said firmly. "My background is in catering, I was looking for a position in your kitchens?"

"All our staff have functional jobs around the hotel as well as working as escorts, ma'am," the woman at the desk replied.

As the girl sighed and groaned in frustration, Kevin stepped into the light, walking over to her. She took a moment to spot him, doing an exaggerated double-take when she finally did, her face twisting in disgust as she recognised him.

"You're determined to see me living on the streets, you are!" she cursed him.

"I think you're following me," Kevin shot back, slowly folding his arms over his chest.

She straightened in what appeared to be an attempt to look taller, tilting her head back to look down her nose at Kevin; a grand feat given that – even in her impossibly high heels – he was almost a foot taller than her.

"You wish!" she growled.

"Everywhere I go, you turn up," Kevin pointed out.

"And everywhere I go, you screw up my chances of getting a job!" she argued. "Devil Chojin!"

"You seem to be a bit obsessed with this whole "Devil Chojin" idea."

"I am! You're evil! I know all about the DMP, I'm not stupid!"

"No, you're not stupid at all, are you? Which is why, I suppose, that after working as a waitress, you're ready to try a career as a prostitute…"

"I wasn't coming here to work as a prostitute! Look, just leave me alone you evil bastard!"

"Whore."

"I'm not a whore! Limey!"

"Bitch!"

"Wanker!"

"Headstrong, stubborn, opinionated cow!"

"Arrogant, unwashed, fucked-up arsehole!"

Kevin paused, watching the girl before him as she glowered at him, her dark eyes flashing with rage. Suddenly he felt something unusual. Although it was an unusual sensation, it seemed to make sense somehow. It was the exact feeling Kevin had expected to feel when he had been back in his hotel room with Mars and the girls.

"I hope the Muscle League come back and wipe you out!" she growled, pointing a finger at Kevin's chest.

"Muscle League fangirl, are we?" Kevin sighed.

"No, just someone who knows the difference between right and wrong!" she argued back. "And if it's all the same with you, I have much better things to do with my time than stand around here and argue with the likes of you!"

She spun on her spiked heels and marched towards the double glass doors, leaving Kevin standing by the reception desk, watching her go. She shoved both doors open and continued on along the street. Kevin hurried over the doors to watch her through the glass.

It was dark outside, and the street she was walking down lead towards a more unsavoury part of the city; but she seemed not to care. It was the sort of street no young girl in her right mind would walk down on her own in broad daylight, and yet here was this upstart of a girl strutting proudly down it in the dark, her head held high with an air of confidence that defied belief.

Kevin gasped as he saw two shadows begin to trail her, closing in on her from behind. Kevin quickly leapt outside, starting after them, only to skid to a halt as the two grabbed at her. Kevin forgot to breathe for a moment as he watched her smack one of her attackers over the head with her handbag and then elbow the other in the gut. She seemed fit for her attackers, and almost looked as though she would manage to fight them off; until she stumbled back onto a gutter, and one of her spiked heels got lodged in between the metal rails.

Her arms flailed at her sides, and she swayed about a little before falling hard into a sitting position, her left foot well and truly stuck. She tried to remove her shoe, but one of her attackers grabbed her bag, and she was forced to grab onto it with both hands in order to keep a hold of it. The other shady figure moved around to her back, pulling out a gun from his inside pocket. He turned it around to hit her over the head with the butt of the weapon; but he never hit his target, as Kevin had already started towards him.

Kevin kicked out at the man standing over the girl, knocking him to the ground. He turned towards the man wrestling with the girl for her bag, but, upon catching the look in Kevin's eye, the man dropped the bag and ran off. His friend scrambled up from Kevin's attack and followed after him. Kevin watch them leave before turning back to the girl as she got to her feet, holding her shoe in both hands, her handbag safely hooked over the crook of her right arm.

"Well, that will teach you to wear such stupid shoes, you stupid girl," he scoffed.

"I didn't need your help, Devil Chojin, I was managing fine on my own!" she retaliated, tugging off her other shoe as she spoke. "And besides, you're evil, you're not supposed to help damsels in distress, right?"

"You, madam, are certainly no "damsel"," Kevin snorted.

"Cheeky bastard," she grumbled.

Kevin frowned, watching her from the corner of his eye as she stretched up onto the balls of her feet, peering over his shoulder at the hotel they had just left. Her eyes slowly moved upwards, and she did something Kevin had never seen her do, something that looked so out of place on her moody face, he stopped breathing for a brief moment again; she smiled. Her smile widened to become a devilish grin, and she dropped back onto the flats of her feet, moving her eyes back to Kevin, her teeth still shining at him through the dark street.

"So, you and that other Devil Chojin have got a room at The Palace, huh?" she asked, trying to suppress her smile.

"I say, how astute of you to notice," Kevin sarcastically replied.

"And your friend is up there with a bevy of beauties, having the time of his life, whilst you were creeping around in the darkened corridors on your own…" she continued.

"Which is lucky for you, I say," Kevin pointed out. "Had I not been "creeping around in the darkened corridors", as you so eloquently put it, who would have saved you from those muggers?"

"I don't know what they call it where you come from, Devil Chojin, but in my neck of the woods they call it floppy dick syndrome."

Kevin rounded on her as she began to giggle to herself, apparently pleased with her miserable attempt at derogatory humour.

"I don't have any problem getting it…" Kevin began, struggling to keep his cool as she began to laugh openly at him. "At least I'm not a uptight virgin."

"What?" she yelped, her smile fading instantly. "Is that the best you can come up with?"

"This isn't a competition! You ungrateful little bitch, I just saved your life!"

"My life didn't need saving, thank you very much, Devil Chojin. I suggest you go back to your hotel. They have a thing in there called a shower. You might want to try acquainting yourself with it."

"I am going now, but not because you told me to, just because I am sick to death of listening to you moan on like some sort of little girl who's trying to have a period!"

"Ah screw you, you pretentious arsehole!"

"Pretentious?"

"Cut your hair and get a job, you useless lay-about!"

"Lose some weight and get laid, you snotty little mare!"

"Get a life, you runaway rich bitch!"

"Get a life and stop following me around!"

"If you really are a wrestler, shouldn't you be off fighting someone somewhere? Y'know, getting dirty and sweaty and beating your head around a ring, knocking out what few brain cells you have left in that blonde airhead of yours?"

"Airhead? You're the one who just gave up the lucrative career of waitressing to become a lady of the night!"

"The only lady of the night here is you!"

"Foolish, loud-mouthed, jumped-up cow!"

"Ignorant, foul-mouthed, pretentious bastard!"

"Bitch!"

"Arsehole!"

Kevin paused, suddenly aware that he was breathing heavily, as though he had just completed a rigorous training session back at the Mask Estate. The crazy girl was standing directly in front of him, one tightly clenched fist held between her own face and his. She was either the bravest, toughest, most confident girl he had ever met, or she was just plain stupid; either way, Kevin could not deny the distinct rushes coursing through his body. Studying her more closely, Kevin could see that she was short of breath too, and every muscle in her body was clenched.

"Are you as turned on as I am?" he asked her quietly.

She paused, the angry glint fading from her eyes as they widened in shock. For a brief moment, she almost looked like a sweet and concerned nice girl; but only for the very briefest of moments. Her face screwed up and she cried out in disgust, swinging her hand as Kevin's face.

She screamed in pain and shock as her hand clanged against Kevin's mask. He began to laugh at her stupidity, but her face twisted into an expression of rage, and she swung up one bare foot at Kevin's crotch. Kevin quickly grabbed her ankle in both hands, jumping back out of the range of her kick.

"Not my knackers!" he yelled.

She faltered for a moment, before the disgusted look returned to her always expressive face.

"Not your knackers?" she repeated. "That's assuming you've even got any!"

"Why would you kick me there if I didn't?" Kevin asked.

"Just let go of my foot, Devil Chojin!"

Kevin cautiously released her foot, taking a few steps back and closing his long coat around his legs for added protection should she try a similar move again.

"I'll get you for this," she growled, gathering up her shoes and her handbag, both of which she had dropped in her anger. "Mark my words, Devil Chojin!"

"I'll be waiting!" Kevin sneered as she marched past him.

Kevin watched her walk on in her bare feet, shaking his head at her. He turned back towards the hotel, feeling oddly satisfied as he began to walk back. He held his head high, and took long, confident strides as he made his way back to The Palace. Kevin felt proud, accomplished, dignified, and–

Clang!

Kevin stopped short, screwing his eyes shut as the dull tone of the impact rang around his iron mask. Slowly he turned around, looking down at the object that had just collided with the back of his head. He crouched down, hooking a finger through a strap hanging from the hot pink stiletto shoe and lifting it up.

Kevin slowly stood up again, turning the shoe around to inspect it. After deducing that it definitely belonged to that angry Amy girl, he lowered his hand to his side, looking down the street. At first, Kevin was overwhelmingly impressed that a girl with such scrawny arms had managed to hurl her shoe such a distance and with such force; but Kevin's impressed state of mind soon faded as she launched her second shoe at him.

Before Kevin could react, the shoe collided with the front of Kevin's mask, the spiked heel neatly lodging into the grill over his forehead, poking into the skin of his forehead just below his hairline.

"Hoi!" he yelled, grabbing at the shoe in an attempt to dislodge it.

But she merely turned around and walked on, leaving Kevin alone to deal with his dilemma. With a groan, Kevin came to the conclusion that he would never get the shoe loose without first removing his mask. Kevin hurried back to the hotel, smiling as he caught sight of a waiter's trolley. He quickly ran over to it, stealing two bottles of champagne and a serving cloth. Kevin threw the cloth over his head to conceal the shoe and then hurried back up to his room.

When Kevin returned to the room, Mars had stripped down to just his wrestling shorts and his headdress; but he looked different somehow.

"C'mon, you're not scared are ya, toots?" Mars snarled, his grin looking positively maniacal as he stalked towards a girl hiding behind the coat-stand and shivering in fear.

"Mars, what the devil are you doing?" Kevin asked, throwing the champagne bottles onto the bed.

"It's called da Mask of Madness, baby!" Mars yelled, grabbing at the girl by the coat-stand.

The girl screamed in fear and ducked out of Mars's reach, leaving him clutching onto the coatstand. Mars snapped it in half in frustration, spinning around and surveying the room.

"Mask of Madness?" Kevin asked quietly, as Mars tossed the remains of the broken coat-stand aside and then crept across the room, looking much like an insane eagle.

His gold visor was lowered over his eyes and nose, and his normally red headdress was bright yellow and spiky, and it appeared to be defying gravity, the ends of it rising up from Mars's back and sides.

"It makes me stronger, faster, better and harder…" Mars growled, before diving at two girls by the bed.

Kevin shook his head as Mars missed the bed, landing hard on the floor space immediately next to the bed. Kevin picked his way over the empty champagne bottles and piles of discarded clothing, gladly locking himself into the bathroom.

Once he was safely alone, Kevin released the latch that held his mask shut around his head, lifting the heavy helmet off and placing it down by the sink. Kevin turned to the mirror, his eyes doubling in size as he caught sight of the small purple circle on his forehead where the heel of the crazy girl's shoe had jabbed into his skin.

"Stupid girl…" he grumbled. "Stupid, argumentative, over-confident, infuriating, feisty, sexy girl."

Kevin put one hand oh his mask, holding it down, and grabbed the pink shoe with his other hand, yanking hard. After three attempts of tugging and twisting the shoe, it finally came loose in Kevin's hand. Kevin slowly held it up in front of his face, eying it over with a smirk.

"She'll be back," he muttered, shifting his eyes from the shoe to his own reflection. "Little Miss Can't-be-wrong will be back. And when she arrives, this Devil Chojin will be ready for her. She doesn't know what she's getting herself into. She's dealing with the bad boys now."

Kevin ran the fingers of one hand through his hair, smirking at his own visage as another thud resounded from the other side of the door, causing a fresh wave of screams to pass over the girls Mars had hired for the night.

"Oh now you're just playin' hard to get, huh?" Mars's muffled voice called out. "Heh, you can run, but you can't hide from da God of War!"

* * *

 **Next Chapter:** Mars and Kevin enjoy their status as the strongest Chojins in the new generation of the DMP, making Edward grow evermore resentful, and making Amy all the more determined to see them destroyed by the Muscle League. **Chapter 5 – The Untouchables**.


	5. The Untouchables

**Disclaimer:** I own Edward and Amy. If I owned all the rest of 'em, I would be doing this full-time, and making a small fortune for my efforts. Hey, I can dream, can't I?

 **Recap:** Kevin and Mars checked into a brothel for the night, but Kevin found more pleasure spending his time in company of one unique woman by the name of Amy.

* * *

 **Chapter 5 – The Untouchables**

Kevin Mask walked with an air of confidence, his pace noticeably slower than usual. He was unsure if Mars's languid pace was finally rubbing off on him, or if finally letting go of his father's intense training regime was causing him to relax, and take things a little more easy; but either way, Kevin could not deny that he was walking very slowly, and he was enjoying every moment of it.

At his side, Mars walked along next to him, looking serious at last; but Kevin suspected that was just because Mars had a terrible hangover from the night before.

"I need one of dose," Mars said monotonously, pointing in a nearby shop window.

"A Thighmaster?" Kevin asked, frowning in the window of the sports shop at the item of exercise equipment Mars appeared to be pointing at.

"No, smartass!" Mars sneered. "A bat! I got battin' practise today, yeah?"

"What?"

Kevin stopped short, frowning at Mars as he kicked a foot through the shop window, reaching a hand through the broken glass to retrieve the metal baseball bat from the display. An irate shopkeeper ran out of the door to shout at him, but Mars hit out a hand, smacking his large hand over the man's face and shoving him back through the broken window.

"Come on, let's go, yeah?" Mars said, turning the bat over in his hands to inspect it as he walked on.

Kevin glanced back and forth between Mars and the bloodied man from the shop, who was dragging himself to his feet amidst the shattered glass of his shop's window display. As the man looked up at Kevin, Kevin darted off after Mars, catching up with his fellow Devil Chojin as Mars climbed onto the back of Kevin's motorbike, still frowning down at the bat in his hands.

"You know Mars, I'm beginning to think that you are the biggest arsehole I have ever known," Kevin said quietly as he stepped over his bike, turning the key in the ignition.

"You wouldn't want me any other way, Mask!" Mars yelled over the roaring engine. "Now shut-up and drive, bitch!"

"I'll give you "bitch"," Kevin grumbled to himself.

Kevin deliberately accelerated away faster than usual, an evil grin lighting his face beneath his mask as Mars fell back to his seat with a groan.

"Atta boy, Mask!" Mars yelled, clapping a hand on Kevin's shoulder. "Now take us out da west side of da city, yeah?"

"The west side?" Kevin yelled back at him. "But headquarters are east of the city!"

"Yeah, but da burbs are west of da city," Mars replied, his tone suggesting Kevin was just being plain stupid to have made such a remark.

"The "burbs"?" Kevin repeated. "Who or what are they?"

"Da burbs!" Mars drawled. "Y'know, da suburbs?"

"The suburbs?"

"Yeah, I got battin' practise! We gotta go through da burbs!"

"Right, of course, now I understand perfectly."

"Yeah, dumbass…"

Kevin gripped onto the handlebars of his bike, still completely at a loss. He still had no idea what Mars was talking about, and it seemed like the more he questioned Mars on the subject, the more confused he became, as Mars made less and less sense.

Mars's morals, in Kevin Mask's mind at least, left a lot to be desired. Kevin was not entirely sure what he had expected the infamous Devil Chojins of the DMP to be like in real life, but Mars was certainly not what Kevin had expected one to be like. Whilst Mars was undoubtedly cruel and rebellious, he seemed more like a petty criminal than a black-hearted Devil Chojin.

Kevin sighed softly to himself as he neared the edge of the city, as thoughts of his younger brother crept to the forefront of his mind. Edward had always been so righteous, so honourable, so dignified; to see him behaving so ludicrously in his new life as a Devil Chojin pained Kevin in ways he could never express with mere words. Their mother would turn in her grave if she could see her youngest son now.

Alice Mask would turn in her grave if she could see her eldest son now, Kevin thought to himself.

A sudden banging sound of metal impacting against metal at speed and with force at Kevin's side awoke him from his thoughts, and he instantly looked down at the side of his motorbike, looking up and down the length of the chassis for signs of damage. When he saw none, Kevin returned his attention to the road ahead, feeling completely bemused. He was certain he had heard two metal objects collide at high speed to his right side, and yet he had not felt any impact, nor was there any sign of any such impact having occurred.

Just as Kevin was recovering from the first banging sound, a second one resounded, this time really shocking him, as it appeared to come from somewhere not too far behind his right ear.

Kevin glanced up over his shoulder at Mars before turning back to the road again. Kevin paused, processing what he had just seen in his mind. When he failed to draw any logical solutions, Kevin turned his head to look back and up at Mars again, wincing as Mars swung his brass baseball bat over the top of Kevin's head and smashed it into a mailbox they were passing, destroying the mailbox and causing the homeowner to come running out onto the street and shout a string of curses after him. Mars threw his head back and laughed, apparently finding the whole affair highly amusing.

"What the bloody hell are you doing?" Kevin yelled at him.

"Huh?" Mars asked, frowning down at Kevin, his smile quickly disappearing.

"I said, what the bloody hell are you doing?" Kevin repeated.

"What does it look like I'm doin'?" Mars asked, before hitting out at another passing mailbox. "It's battin' practise, ain't it?"

"Batting practise, right…" Kevin grumbled, turning back to the road. "And here was I thinking that the DMP were a force to be reckoned with…"

"What, you wanna go kick some ass?" Mars asked him.

"I thought we were meant to be Devil Chojins, warriors with hearts of pure evil, representatives of–"

"Yeah, yeah, whatever! Take us back to HQ. We can have fun dere too."

Kevin sighed in relief, turning off at the next side road to rejoin the main road back to the underground cave the DMP called their headquarters. Behind him Mars sat back down, appearing to be finally acting like a serious Devil Chojin. Kevin had not joined the DMP to have "fun" as Mars put it.

"Hey Mask, do you ever take dis thing off?" Mars asked, clanging his bat against the side of Kevin's iron helmet.

"Get off of me!" Kevin yelled, swiping a hand at the bat. "And no, I don't ever take it off!"

"Den how do you eat?"

"Never mind."

"And don't you never wash?"

"Just leave it."

"What about when you're wid a girl, how do you–"

"I'll tell you later."

"Tell me now."

"No."

"Why not?"

"Because I need to find my brother first."

"Eddie? What? Why?"

"There's something really important that I have to tell him."

"Aw, man!"

* * *

Kevin Mask slowed his pace as he approached the vicious training ring set up in the centre of the room the DMP used for their more intensive training sessions. Mars continued to walk on, passing Kevin and carrying on his way to the ring, apparently unfazed by what lay before him; which surprised Kevin, since what was transpiring in front of him was a more accurate representation of what, in Kevin's opinion at least, the DMP should be all about.

Doomsmane snarled, swiping out a clawed hand and effortlessly swatting a large teenage boy with what looked like chess pieces on his shoulders from the ring. Mars stumbled to an abrupt halt as he sighted the giant dragon Chojin beating his way through the young DMP trainees, an action that peaked Kevin's interest.

"Scarface," Doomsmane sighed, reaching out a clawed hand at another teenage boy approaching him. "You better not have come here to piss and moan again."

Kevin gasped involuntarily as Doomsmane grabbed his hand over the boy's face, sharply closing his fist, his claws tearing through the boy's skin and flesh. Mars stood stoically by the side of the ring as one of the boy's eyeballs fell from his head. Doomsmane grinned down at Mars as he lifted his hand back from the boy, revealing to Mars and Kevin that he had just successfully removed the boy's face and cracked his skull.

"No-one is irreplaceable, boys," the dragon reminded them both as the boy fell to the mat dead.

"Where's Eddie Mask?" Mars asked, his voice sounding suddenly small and weak to Kevin's ears.

"Your little boy?" Doomsmane asked as he pushed the corpse out of the ring with one foot. "Well how should I know? Maybe you should shorten his leash."

Doomsmane swung a roundhouse kick at a Chojin resembling a malformed dinosaur, knocking him to the ground.

"Hang around, scarface," Skulldozer suggested as he climbed into the ring next to Doomsmane. "Eddie usually always shows up when he thinks that you're fighting."

Mars glanced over his shoulder at Kevin, before turning back to the two Legend Devil Chojins. Kevin sensed that Mars was seeking his support, and so he slowly made his way over to Mars's side, his eyes fixed on Doomsmane and Skulldozer as he approached the ring.

They were training in the ring Kevin had first found his brother training in, with its cruel ropes of barbed wire and mat of steel wool; but for added severity, blazing torches had been skewered into the ring-posts, and the lingering scent of burned hair and flesh informed Kevin that they had already been put to good use.

"Ah, if it isn't Kevin Mask!" Doomsmane brightened, turning his attentions to Kevin. "I hope you're not another whinging nancy boy like your brother."

Kevin chose to remain diplomatically silent, as he could not think of an answer that would not either overly offend Doomsmane or make him seem like an idiot himself.

"Well, what are you standing around there for?" Doomsmane snapped irritably. "Come on up here and show us what you've got."

Kevin ran his eyes over Doomsmane and quickly scanned over Skulldozer before turning to Mars for advice.

"Well, what you waitin' for, Mask?" Mars asked him in a low voice. "Get up dere and kick his ass!"

Kevin nodded his head at Mars, and started towards the ring. He kept his attentions focussed on Doomsmane and Skulldozer as he climbed into the ring beneath the bottom rope, wary of being ambushed or unfairly beaten by the duo.

"Let me see if you can make Skulldozer tap out," Doomsmane suggested, stepping back to allow Kevin to face his fellow Devil Chojin alone in the centre of the ring.

"I'll even let you have the first shot," Skulldozer offered.

"A mistake you will all too soon regret," Kevin growled.

Kevin swung a punch at Skulldozer's head, but Skulldozer caught Kevin's fist in his hand. Kevin quickly spun around and grabbed Skulldozer's arm with his other hand, flinging Skulldozer over his shoulder and onto his back on the mat. Kevin quickly aimed an elbow drop at Skulldozer's chest, but Skulldozer rolled out of the way, causing Kevin to fall hard to the mat below, the steel wool piercing through his clothing along one leg and at his elbow.

Skulldozer got to his feet and started towards Kevin, but Kevin quickly kicked out with one foot, kicking the backs of Skulldozer's ankles and knocking him onto his back again. Kevin quickly scrambled to his feet, kicking Skulldozer in the back of the head as he tried to get up again. Kevin reached down to grab Skulldozer up again, but something caught his DMP shirt from behind, halting his progress. Kevin froze as a warm breath growled over his shoulder.

"I can see why scarface befriended you," Doomsmane snarled quietly. "You're just another hotshot. You think you've got what it takes, but you're nothing…"

Doomsmane threw Kevin towards the barbed wires ropes, but Kevin was able to stop himself just before he collided with the wires. He let out a small sigh of relief, but his complacency cost him dearly; in the moment that he let down his defences, Doomsmane pounced onto him again, grabbing his arm and the back of his neck.

Too shocked by the suddenness and direction of the attack, Kevin took too long to figure out what his attacker had planned for him. Before Kevin knew what was happening, he was suddenly being forced towards one of the flaming corner-posts.

Kevin yelled out, a cold sweat passing over him. He wanted to fight back, but the sight of the flames so close to his face brought back memories that did something to Kevin that no-one and nothing else in the world could: they frightened him to the point of disability.

"Geddoff, you no good, cheatin' son of a bitch!" Mars yelled, leaping over the top rope and racing towards them.

Mars threw himself at Doomsmane's side, throwing him off Kevin with a powerful shoulder tackle, knocking the dragon Chojin back against the barbed wire ropes. Doomsmane hissed and snarled in pain, and Skulldozer quickly grabbed Mars from behind, winding an arm around Mars's neck in a blatant attempt to strangle the life out of him.

"Kevin," Mars choked, reaching a hand out towards Kevin, who was sitting cowering by the corner of the ring. "A little help here?"

"As if anyone would want to help you!" Doomsmane yelled, stepping forwards and raking a clawed hand down across Mars's chest, tearing through his wrestling gear and skin alike. "Just remember, scarface, I'm your only friend…"

Doomsmane threw his head back and began to laugh maniacally, the image of his green face blurring and fading as Mars began to lose consciousness in his chokehold. Mars swung back an elbow, striking Skulldozer in the gut; but Skulldozer merely responded by tightening his hold on Mars's neck, forcing a lungful of air out of Mars's throat.

"Now let me see, where was I?" Doomsmane said, wiping an imaginary tear of laughter from one eye. "Ah yes, I was about to fry the eldest son of Sir Robin Mask alive."

Doomsmane turned his back on Mars and reached for Kevin. With what little strength he had left, Mars kicked out a foot at Doomsmane's back, his kick sending Doomsmane staggering into the cornerpost. To Mars's relief, Kevin seemed to have finally snapped out of his trance, and he was on his feet at Doomsmane's side.

Kevin grabbed both hands over Doomsmane's snout and yanked his head over backwards, causing the dragon's back and neck to bend the one way they were not meant to. Mars grinned weakly as Kevin hoisted Doomsmane over his shoulders into a move Robin Mask himself had used known as the Tower Bridge.

"Help me!" Doomsmane snarled. "Skulldozer!"

Skulldozer reluctantly released Mars, starting towards Kevin. Mars rubbed at his neck, narrowing his eyes as he watched Skulldozer walk away from him. He waited until Skulldozer was almost upon Kevin before charging after him.

Mars silently prayed that he could pull off the move he had in mind, as even the slightest error would cost him dearly. He ran at Skulldozer, aiming himself to one side of the DMP Legend. As he caught up with Skulldozer, Mars grabbed his arms around Skulldzoer's neck and leapt into the air, setting him up for a Bulldog, aiming himself over the top of the barbed wire ropes.

Mars closed his eyes as he anticipated the worst, not opening them again until he felt his feet thump onto the stone floor of the cave. Staggering to regain his balance, Mars turned back to the ring, grinning widely as he saw that he had successfully impaled Skulldozer, face-first, into the top line of wire.

Mars sauntered back over to the ring, sliding under the bottom rope. Unable to restrain his grin from being anything other than goofy, Mars slowly strode over to Doomsmane's head, watching in delight as the Devil Chojin writhed in pain over Kevin's shoulders.

"Bastard!" Doomsmane snarled at Mars.

"Uncle," Mars corrected him. "If you wanna quit, you gotta say uncle."

"Never!" Doomsmane roared.

"Okay."

Mars grabbed one hand over Doomsmane's top jaw and the other over his bottom jaw.

"I guess if you ain't got nothin' to say, you won't mind me just makin' a wish…" Mars whispered, tugging sharply on both of Doomsmane's jaws.

Doomsmane screamed out in pain and Mars began to laugh. Kevin dropped Doomsmane from his shoulders, allowing him to fall to the mat, where he rolled over, landing in an ungraceful heap by the corner.

"The sick, horrid fuck!" Kevin yelled, stomping into Doomsmane's ribs. "I hope you rot in hell, you evil, twisted bastard!"

Mars nodded his head, folding his arms over his chest as he watched Kevin kick and stomp relentlessly on his least favourite Devil Chojin.

"Die, you bastard!" Kevin roared, stomping on Doomsmane's head.

Mars quirked an eyebrow at Kevin, his arms dropping to his sides as he watched on. Whilst Mars detested Doomsmane with a passion, and rather relished watching the dragon being beaten to a pulp, he was beginning to suspect Kevin was taking things a little too far; after all, what had Doomsmane ever done to Kevin?

"Okay, Kev, dat's enough, yeah?" Mars said, reaching out a hand to Kevin's shoulder.

"Get off of me!" Kevin snapped, hitting Mars's hand away.

"Whoa…" Mars muttered, frowning at Kevin as his attacks began to become frantic.

Mars glanced around himself nervously, for the first time in his life relieved to see Edward Mask and his two friends running towards them. Mars ducked back out of the way as the three teenagers dove into the ring, aiming themselves at Kevin. Mars slunk back to the opposite side of the ring, watching curiously as Kevin proceeded to fight off all three of his new attackers with an energy that made Mars shiver. Kevin was so fuelled with anger he almost looked as though he was glowing, an unusual golden aura lingering around him.

Once he had successfully left everyone bar Mars lying flat on their backs in the ring, Mars cautiously made his way back over to Kevin, who stood panting in the centre of the ring, glancing about himself as though looking for someone else to obliterate.

"You okay?" Mars asked him.

"You're all sick bastards!" Kevin yelled, marching up to Mars.

Kevin bashed his shoulder into Mars's as he passed him, causing Mars to stumble back from the force of the blow. Mars turned to watch Kevin leap over the top rope and hop down to the ground below. Mars watched Kevin until he was out of sight, before turning back to the carnage the British Chojin had left in his wake.

"Somethin' definitely ain't right…" he muttered, as Skulldozer rolled over, groaning in pain.

Mars turned around and ran after Kevin, running down the endless network of corridors and caves that made up the underground warren that was the DMP headquarters. Mars had no idea where Kevin might have gone to, but he guessed that it would be either to Mars's cave, to Pumpinator's cave or outside to his motorbike.

Mars kept running, shoving aside anyone who got in his way, looking in every cave he passed.

"Mask?" Mars called, creeping into his own cave, which opened out onto the side of the mountain. "Hey Kevin? Mask? You in here?"

Mars was more than a little apprehensive that Kevin may turn on him, and so he kept low, his eyes darting around the shadowy recesses of the cave as he crept further towards the mouth. The sudden sound of a stone falling made Mars leap back, and he watched as a rock the size of his fist fell over the front of the mouth of the cave, landing on the jagged mountain face where it split in two.

Mars looked up at the roof of the cave knowingly, walking boldly up to the mouth of the cave.

"Hey Mask, I know you're out dere, I can smell you," he said as he walked out onto the mountainside.

Mars clambered up over the top of the cave, looking up at a ledge nearer the summit, where a lone figure sat hunched over, facing the setting sun.

"Hey Mask, whatcha doin' up here, huh?" Mars asked, making his way over to Kevin's side.

"They're sick," Kevin muttered, grabbing up a handful of small rocks and tossing them over the edge of the ledge.

"Yeah, well, dis is da DMP," Mars pointed out as he sat himself down next to Kevin. "What did you expect? We ain't da Boy Scouts, you know."

"I know. I just don't see the need to fight with fire," Kevin replied.

"Fire?" Mars responded, turning his head towards Kevin. "It was da fire dat made you go crazy back dere?"

"I just… It brought back some memories I would rather forget."

"You're scared of fire?"

"I am not "scared of fire"! I'm not scared of anything! I just don't like fire very much, that's all!"

"I see…"

"My mother died in a fire."

"Oh."

"There was a fire in our house many years ago. My mother and father got out, but Edward and I were stuck. My mother went back in for us. She got Edward out first. They begged her not to go in again, but she did. I was stuck in the library, and she came in for me. She helped me through the house. It was awful there were flames and smoke everywhere. We got to the stairwell, but the fire had burned through the top section of the steps, and there was no way down. We ran back to my parents' bedroom, and out onto the balcony. She pushed me over the edge, and my father caught me on the ground. But my mother didn't have time to jump. The balcony collapsed, and she was trapped in the rubble."

"Whoa, dat's harsh."

"She survived, but when they got her to the hospital, the doctors said she was too badly injured to live on. Her internal organs were squashed and damaged, pierced by broken bones… She spoke to my father on his own at first, but then she asked to see me on my own. She made me promise to take good care of Edward, to make sure he grew up to be a respectable and honourable young man. She dearly wanted him to become a doctor like her father had been. She asked me to make sure my father didn't work him too hard, and to make sure Edward didn't fall in with any bad crowds. I failed her."

"No, you didn't fail her!"

"Mars, my brother is a wrestler, not a doctor. And he fights for the DMP, who are the worst possible crowd any boy could fall in with."

"But you did da best you could, right?"

"I should have done more… I just don't want to fight in rings made of fire any more, okay?"

"Okay."

Mars sighed, turning his head away from Kevin. He winced at the thought of how Kevin would react when he found out that one of the trials of the DMP Academy involved crossing a flaming pit of lava at a great height; a seeming metaphor for the situation that had killed Alice Mask. Mars decided not to say anything on the matter just yet, deciding that Kevin might not even have to do that trial, so it was not worth concerning him it at such a moment in time.

"Hey look, da stars are comin' out!" Mars said in an attempt to brighten the mood.

Kevin looked up at the darkening sky, through which small dots of white were slowly emerging. He and Mars sat in silence then, watching the stars slowly twinkle to life before them, brightening as the sun sank lower and lower in the sky. As they sat there watching the sky, neither Mars nor Kevin realised that they were being watched.

"Mars and Kevin Mask," a voice whispered thoughtfully from behind a rock further round the side of the mountain. "Kevin's younger brother is in the DMP, even after Kevin promised his mother he would look after him, and Kevin is afraid of fire…"

Amy quickly finished off writing down her notes, smiling to herself as she eyed them over.

"I knew they were DMP," she whispered to herself as she spied on Mars and Kevin. "And now that I know where their hideout is, all I have to do is hang about for a bit, and I'll have myself the best story yet. Channel five will pay a fortune for this story…"

Amy smirked to herself, taking one last glance at Mars and Kevin before slinking off into the shadows.

* * *

 **Next Chapter:** After word of them defeating Doomsmane and Skulldozer gets around, big brother Kevin and idol Mars are the new top dogs of the DMP, leaving Edward feeling a little neglected. Along with his two friends, Edward starts to formulate a plan for revenge on the duo; but he's not the only one out to cause trouble for Kevin Mask and Mars. **Chapter 6 – In the Shadows**.


	6. In the Shadows

**A/N:** This chapter is a bit like the film _Sliding Doors_. You get to see the story from two different perspectives that should run concurrently, but are told separately. That makes it sound complicated. And it's not. Honest…

 **WARNING** this chapter is laden with issues.

 **Disclaimer:** I don't own any of the characters except Edward and Amy. And I don't own the song _In The Shadows_ by The Rasmus. I don't even own any part of the above-mentioned film, _Sliding Doors_. So basically, I'm just a thief!

 **Recap:** Kevin and Mars took on Doomsmane and Skulldozer in a spur of the moment challenge, which revealed that Kevin has a fear of fire after his mother's death. Kevin confided his fear to Mars, but neither knew that Amy overheard Kevin's heartfelt confession.

* * *

 **Chapter 6 – In the Shadows**

"Stay back!" Edward snapped irritably, slapping a hand against the chest of his fellow Devil Chojin to halt his progress.

At either side of him, Edward's two cohorts respectfully stepped back, allowing Edward alone to peer around the corner of the tree trunk, out across the clearing at the temporary training area for the elite of the DMP.

"I might have known they would be here," Edward grumbled, squinting against the mid-day sun at the scene before him.

Inside the ring, Edward's big brother Kevin Mask was standing back-to-back with the Devil Chojin Edward had always admired the most: Mars. The two were beckoning anyone and everyone to challenge them, effortlessly beating down any who dared to accept their offer.

"I wouldn't mind so much if they were actually training, but as it is, they are just showing off!" Edward spat. "I hate them both! But I especially hate Kevin!"

Edward crept along to the next tree at the edge of the forest, his eyes fixed on his brother and Mars as he went. His friends diligently shuffled along behind him, remaining silent and keeping a respectful distance behind their self-appointed leader; not that Edward really noticed what they did at that precise moment in time.

Edward scowled beneath his black mask as he crept through the shadows of the trees, muttering curses as his brother successfully fought off his challengers, tossing aside their limp and defeated bodies as though they were just dolls. Many of those who were brave enough to step into the makeshift ring to confront Kevin and Mars were Chojins Edward himself had fought in the past, and failed to so much as land a single punch on, this thought only further irritating Edward.

Edward began to seethe in his own anger and hatred. All his life, Kevin had been the favourite one. Kevin had always excelled at everything, and Edward had always been cast aside and forgotten about. The DMP had been his one place of refuge from his older brother, and now Kevin had even managed to spoil that for him. And not only had Kevin spoiled Edward's fun at the DMP, but he had also stolen Edward's best friend from him. The bastard.

 _I've been watching_  
 _I've been waiting  
In the shadows  
For my time_

Edward stopped walking again, snarling over his shoulder as one of his associates stumbled into his side. As his friend slunk back, Edward turned back to the ring, smoothing his gloved hands around the rough bark of the tree, his glowing green eyes thinning as he watched the events inside the ring unfold. Kevin was holding a Devil Chojin in a move their father had taught them, known as the Tower Bridge. Mars was watching on, looking curiously interested in the fundamentals of the move. Edward edged closer, watching as Mars grabbed the next warrior brave enough to enter the ring, a teenager Edward knew as Checkmate, a pupil of Legend Chojin Sunshine's.

Mars hoisted Checkmate up into the air and set him up into the Tower Bridge hold, watching Kevin as he did so to ensure that he was executing the move correctly, achieving the hold's maximum efficiency. With his arms up at his sides and his shoulders supporting the weight of his rather bulky opponent, every muscle in Mars's body was working hard to hold his stance. As he ran his eyes over the rippling sinews of Mars's chest, Edward gripped his fingers into the bark of the tree trunk, dry brown flakes frittering to the ground as he did so. Kevin had stolen so many things from Edward he was not going to allow his brother to steal a man as magnificent as Mars from him. Edward had worked so hard to get close to Mars, he had waited so patiently for stolen moments alone with him, planning so carefully how he and Mars would one day take ownership of the DMP for themselves; he was not about to stand by and let his older brother take something else good out of his life.

 _I've been searching  
I've been living  
For tomorrows  
All my life_

Kevin tossed aside his opponent, turning to Mars, who was still holding Checkmate in the Tower Bridge.

"Dis kid can't feel no pain," Mars said, his deep rasping voice carrying across the clearing to Edward's ears.

"Then maybe it was time we taught him how!" Kevin snarled.

Edward crept onwards, along the trees, all the time concealing himself in the shadows and all the time getting ever closer to lining himself up directly with Mars. As he watched on, Sunshine crawled into the ring and began to berate Kevin, only to be promptly knocked out of the ring again by the elder Mask. Sunshine's other pupil, the dinosaur Chojin Tyrannoclaw jumped in and began a battle with Kevin; all the while Mars tenaciously kept his hold on Checkmate.

Checkmate was still very young and not as bulky as Mars or Kevin, but he was by means a small or lightweight wrestler, and the strain of holding his weight so high off the ground for such a great length of time was beginning to show on Mars. A layer of sweat coated his face, glistening in the bright sunlight. As Edward spotted this he staggered to a halt, swinging back an impatient fist at the face of the DMP trainee who stumbled into him.

Edward slunk over to the nearest tree, hiding behind it to watch Mars. He was now standing directly in front of Mars, although he was still a good distance away from him. Edward was not a patient person, and what little patience he did possess had long since worn thin waiting for Mars. Mars's playful nature had been just one of his many qualities that had first attracted Edward to him; but now Mars's jovial outlook merely irritated Edward. Mars was nothing more than a tease.

Edward had never really wanted to join the DMP. He had never even wanted to become a wrestler – training under Robin Mask and Warsman as a child had been enough to put him off that career path for life; but when Mars had walked into his life, his opinion on the matter had quickly changed. At first, Edward saw Mars as a hero, someone to look up to, someone to respect. Mars was everything Edward wanted his own father to be, and the thought of life with a fun-loving Mars was infinitely preferable to a life of pain and torture under Robin Mask.

Mars always claimed that he had kidnapped Edward, but the truth of the matter was that Edward had willingly gone with him.

Over the years he had spent in the DMP, Edward had changed his mindset, his ambitions, his passions and even his heart to get closer to Mars. Edward had endured training sessions and brainwashing campaigns from the Legends of the DMP, he had suffered lectures from the likes of Sunshine, Doomsmane and Skulldozer; he had fought in a wrestling ring against some of the toughest wrestlers known to the universe. The DMP way was not Edward's way, but he was willing to do whatever it took to get closer to Mars.

They say That I must learn to kill Before I can feel safe

 _But I  
I'd rather kill myself  
Than turn into their slave_

Mars finally threw Checkmate over the top rope, sauntering back towards the centre of the ring where Kevin had just executed a perfect Big Ben Bash on Tyrannoclaw. The ground around the outside of the training ring was littered with the battered and beaten bodies of several defeated Chojins.

"Feh!" Edward scoffed. "I will make my brother regret ever coming to the DMP if it's the last thing I do! And as for Mars, betraying me like this…I'll make them pay. We will make them pay."

Edward glanced over each of his shoulders in turn, each time receiving a nod from his friends who stood either side of him.

"And I will rule the DMP alone…" Edward growled, narrowing his eyes at the confident duo in the ring as they basked in the glory of their destruction.

* * *

Amy gasped as her feet slipped over the rubble on the ground below, quickly dropping down to hide behind a rock. Her heart was thumping hard in her chest, making so much noise she could no longer hear herself think. Whilst she detested the DMP and all they stood for, and sought to see the gang of evil wrestlers disbanded and destroyed, Amy still reserved a healthy fear of the infamous league of Devil Chojin warriors.

Gulping hard over the tight lump in her throat, Amy cautiously peered over the top of the rock, looking down the hillside at the temporary training area for the elite of the DMP, which had been set up halfway between a wooded area and the foot of the hill she was hiding on. Squinting against the mid-day sun, Amy focussed her attention on the action that was taking place within the ring, a smirk creeping onto her face at what she saw.

Inside the ring, the arrogant and would-be comedian Mars was standing back-to-back with the arrogant and would-be intellectual Kevin Mask. The two Devil Chojins were beckoning anyone and everyone to challenge them, effortlessly beating down any who dared to accept their offer.

Seeing that all those below her were suitably distracted by the antics of Mars and Kevin Mask, Amy found the courage to move closer to the action. She cautiously crept along the side of the hill, keeping herself hidden from view behind rocks and plants as she went, her eyes darting between the ring and her next choice of covering as she made her way round and down.

Occasionally Amy paused to watch either Mars or Kevin successfully fight off another challenger, tossing their limp carcasses aside as though they were mere dolls. It looked as though Kevin and Mars were super-powered freaks fighting children; but Amy knew better. Those challenging the duo were all super-powered freaks themselves, any one of which could kill her effortlessly and in the blink of an eye. Amy shivered involuntarily, unsure if she was frightened of Mars and Kevin or just disgusted. Either way, she was beginning to gain a certain amount of respect for them both.

Amy glanced at the ring, turned back to the path in front of her, and then turned back to the ring again, her dark eyes almost popping out of her head in shock at what she saw. She slunk back, concealing herself behind another large rock, smoothing her hands around the stone as she fearfully watched the events inside the ring. Kevin Mask was holding a Devil Chojin in a move that looked something like a replica of the old torture device known as The Rack. The large, but gangly, teenage boy was lying across Kevin's broad shoulders on his back, with Kevin holding him in place by hooking one hand around the boy's chin and the other over one of the boy's thighs. It almost looked as though Kevin were trying to bend his back backwards; like it was some sort of modified back-breaker manoeuvre.

Amy had become a fan of the old IWF fights in her early teenage years, and although she had never really understood the technicalities of the moves the wrestlers used, she did think that this move Kevin was using looked familiar somehow; she just could not remember where she had seen it before. Mars appeared to be equally as intrigued by the move, as he was watching on, carefully studying the fundamentals of the move. As Amy watched, Mars grabbed the next warrior brave enough to enter the ring, another tall and lanky teenage boy.

Mars hoisted the boy up into the air and set him up into the same hold Kevin was using, watching Kevin as he did so to ensure he was executing the move correctly, achieving the hold's maximum efficiency. Watching the two Devil Chojins torturing their opponents sent another shiver down Amy's spine. Why had she even come to this awful place to begin with?

Amy looked down at her notebook, where she had fervently scribbled her various observations regarding Kevin Mask, Mars, the hideout and the DMP in general. Any right-thinking person would have reported such findings to the relevant authorities, but Amy was determined to turn her notes into a story, one that she could sell to the mass media. She knew she was playing a very dangerous game, but a hidden force was driving her on, a determination she never before knew she possessed fuelling her ambitions. She had started now, she thought to herself, there was no point in stopping until she had achieved what she sought.

 _Sometimes I feel that I should go and play with the thunder  
Somehow  
I just don't want to stay and wait for a wonder_

Kevin tossed aside his opponent, turning to Mars, who was still holding his opponent in the torturous rack-like submission hold.

"Dis kid can't feel no pain," Mars said, his voice sending another wave of fear over Amy; he sounded so very close, closer than he actually was.

"Then maybe it was time we taught him how!" Kevin snarled, his voice sounding even closer than Mars's.

Amy gasped as she finally saw a familiar face amidst the sea of DMP recruits before her, an infamous face that banished any doubts that may have been lingering in her mind as to whether or not she truly was watching a DMP training session; as she watched on, Legend DMP Devil Chojin Sunshine crawled into the ring and began to berate Kevin, only to be promptly knocked out of the ring by the new generation DMP member. Upon seeing this, another Devil Chojin, one who looked like some sort of mutated dinosaur, jumped into the ring and began a battle with Kevin.

As Amy watched Kevin Mask dominate his challenger, she once more suffered an attack of nerves; what had possessed her to follow them back to the DMP hideout in the first place? So what it they had cost her a job? So what if they kept appearing everywhere she went? They had never actually harmed her, and so she had no real reason to want revenge upon them. Other than Mars's rude remarks and lewd suggestions, neither man had done anything to warrant such insane and dangerous behaviour on her part.

As Kevin threw his opponent up into the air, leaping up after him and setting him up into a devastating manoeuvre that ended with the dinosaur landing on his head from a great height, his fall being accelerated and accentuated by Kevin forcing him down, Amy slowly thinned her eyes, her vision blocking out everything else around her until all she could see was Mars and Kevin, standing in the midst of a quagmire of defeated Chojins, looking smug and arrogant about their victories. Although she had no reason to hate either one of them and no reason to seek revenge in any way upon them, Amy could not help the distinct surge of hatred she felt for Kevin Mask. Mars she could forget about, but Kevin was different.

Amy decided she would continue to watch both Chojins, particularly Kevin, to learn all she could about them before taking any action. In the absence of any further challengers, Kevin and Mars were actively surveying the area beyond the ring for any signs of anyone they could beat into submission. As they scanned the area over the foot of the hill, Amy ducked back down behind the rock, hiding herself in the shadow of the rock, holding her breath as she silently prayed that they had not spotted her.

 _I've been watching  
I've been waiting  
In the shadows  
For my time_

"I'll get them back," she whispered to herself. "But not today, not yet."

 _I've been searching  
I've been living  
For tomorrows  
All my life_

Amy slowly craned her neck forwards, peeking around the side of the rock. She gasped as she saw that Kevin and Mars had disappeared, panicking as she feared the worst; but as she leaned further forwards, she saw the pair swaggering off towards a large black motorbike. Amy sighed in relief, grabbing up her belongings and scurrying off up the hillside, deciding she would get a better view of the action from a higher vantage point.

And she was less likely to be seen or to get caught if she stayed well out of the way.

* * *

 **Next Chapter:** Kevin Mask begins his training at the DMP Academy to become a fully-fledged Devil Chojin, accompanied by Mars making his fourth attempt to graduate. Things go from bad to worse for the duo as their relationship begins to deteriorate thanks to the interference of a vengeful little brother and a determined girl. **Chapter 7 – The Academy**.


	7. The Academy

**Disclaimer:** Still don't own Ultimate Muscle, but I'm claiming ownership of the explanation I give for Mars's healing/scarring issues.

 **Recap:** Edward and Amy are stalking Kevin and Mars, each with their own grudges and desires for revenge on the duo, but Kevin and Mars are blissfully unaware of it all as they bask in the glory of being the stars of the DMP.

* * *

 **Chapter 7 – The Academy**

Kevin Mask sat on the edge of a rock in the open cave Mars inhabited in the DMP headquarters, slowly exercising his left arm with a fifty kilo dumbbell. As he reached his twentieth rep he paused, his arm fully curled, lifting his head to look across the cave at Mars.

It had been some six weeks since Kevin had joined the DMP, and he had spent most of his time there in Mars's company. Other than frequent and vigorous sexual orgies and random and sporadic practise bouts with his fellow Devil Chojins, Mars never appeared to exercise at all. He certainly ate plenty, enough to maintain his monstrous weight of over 300 pounds; but how he kept that mass as muscle was still a mystery to Kevin.

Kevin slowly lowered his dumbbell to the ground, sitting back to study Mars more fully. Mars was lying flat on his back, his hands acting as a pillow behind his head. His chin was jutted forwards as he was balancing another spliff between his teeth, his cheeks slowly drawing inwards as he drew hard on it, before slowly blowing out the smoke through his nostrils.

Kevin silently stood, squinting through the darkness at Mars. His eyes were closed, and the languid rise and fall of his chest with every slow and deep breath almost suggested that he was actually asleep; but surely he could not still smoke a joint in his sleep?

"What an unusual bloke…" Kevin muttered to himself.

Mars did not so much as bat an eyelid at Kevin's remark, even though it had been just loud enough to be heard if Mars were still conscious. Deciding that Mars was perhaps better – and indeed more tolerable – company when he was stoned and sleepy rather than hyper and horny, Kevin left Mars to do what he wished, making his way over to the mouth of the cave.

The air inside the cave was thick and sickly with the smoke from Mars's idle puffing, and Kevin needed to get some fresh air, especially since his intensive weight training session had left him breathing heavier than usual. Despite Mars's constant reassurances to the contrary, Kevin still believed that being in Mars's vicinity when he smoked marijuana was almost as bad as smoking it for himself.

Kevin marched out onto the hillside, dropping into a defensive crouch on instinct as he heard something move suddenly and with speed above and behind his head. Twisting around without breaking his stance, Kevin nervously scanned the hillside above the mouth of the cave in vain, before spinning around suspiciously as he found himself suddenly sensing something directly behind him.

But still Kevin failed to find a source for the sound. He slowly straightened up again, relaxing out of his position as he tried to dismiss the thought in his mind. Perhaps it had just been a wild animal of some sorts. Or perhaps not. That had not been the first time Kevin had felt the distinct sensation that someone, or indeed something, was close by and watching him.

"Hey Kevin, what cha doin'?" Mars called to him from inside the cave.

"Shh!" Kevin hissed.

"Huh?" Mars grunted. "Yous is all vertical, try chillin' out some more, yeah? Or least just move your ass, you're blockin' out my moonlight over here!"

"There's someone out here!" Kevin hissed.

"Say what?"

Mars sat up, frowning at Kevin. He took one last draw on his homemade cigarette before plucking it from his mouth and flicking it to one side. With a groan of displeasure and annoyance Mars pushed himself to his feet, trudging over to Kevin's side, stretching his arms above his head as he stopped on the ledge outside.

"Huh?" he asked, turning to Kevin.

"What?" Kevin snapped, rounding on him.

"Huh?" Mars repeated, his voice louder.

"What?" Kevin asked, sounding slightly confused.

"Huh?" Mars grunted again.

"What?" Kevin asked. "Why are you saying "huh" at me? I didn't say anything!"

"You didn't?" Mars asked.

"No, I didn't," Kevin assured him.

"You sure?"

"Positive."

"Oh… I guess I oughta stop smokin' for tonight den, I'm gettin' all suspicious."

"Smoking does that to you?"

"Yeah. It makes you all edgy and suspicious. Just like yous is bein' right now, Kev."

"I heard something moving out here!"

Mars lazily looked up, down and all around himself before shaking his head at Kevin.

"Nah, dere ain't nobody out here," he concluded. "You need to lay offa dat weed, Kev."

"But I haven't had any," Kevin pointed out.

"You haven't?" Mars echoed. "Den how come dere ain't none left?"

"Gee, I don't know, Mars," Kevin sneered sarcastically. "Perhaps because you smoked it all yourself?"

"I did?"

A lazy grin slowly worked its way onto Mars's face as he began to nod his head.

"I guess dat would explain why I'm so damn hungry," he said, patting a hand onto his perfectly flat stomach.

Kevin growled in frustration as he eyed Mars's impeccable abdomen, which he was apparently highly undeserving of.

"Shouldn't we be training?" he demanded irritably.

Mars's smile faded as he eyed Kevin over darkly.

"You know Kevin, I'm beginnin' to think dat you need some help," he said in a low voice. "Cause yous has a got a real problem relaxin', you know what I'm sayin'?"

"Relaxing?" Kevin yelped. "I came here to train hard, to get stronger and to prepare myself to take on those idiots at the IWF!"

"Yeah, me too," Mars agreed. "But all dis talk about action is makin' me hungry, so let's go eat somethin' first, yeah?"

"Alright," Kevin grumbled, following after Mars as he slowly made his way across the cave and back into the bowels of the DMP headquarters.

As the duo disappeared from the cave, Edward dropped down from his hiding place above the mouth of the cave, creeping into Mars's place of refuge, looking wildly around himself. His eyes eventually settled on the dumbbell his brother had been training with, a snort of disgust reverberating through his nostrils as he made his way over to it.

"He thinks he's so tough…" Edward muttered, bending over and grabbing onto the weight with one hand.

Edward started to lift the weight, but promptly dropped it back down again as a searing pain stabbed through his lower back.

"Shit!" he cursed, straightening instantly and reaching a hand to the source of the pain, his actions only worsening his suffering,

Edward hissed in pain, scowling from beneath his mask at the innocent looking dumbbell at his feet.

"Bastard," he muttered, kicking a foot at the weight.

After his action achieved nothing more than stubbing his toe, Edward turned his back on Kevin's training area and started in the direction Mars and Kevin had headed, silently glad that he was wearing steel-toed boots.

Ahead of Edward, Kevin was still following Mars through the endless labyrinth of underground caves and tunnels, growing increasingly impatient as they went. It felt to Kevin as though they were walking round in circles, and given Mars's somewhat less than coherent state, he knew that his assumption was probably not far from the truth. As they passed yet another cave Kevin was certain they had already passed by at least once before, Kevin prepared himself to quiz Mars on exactly where he was going; but before he got the opportunity to do so, Mars stumbled abruptly to a halt in front of him, having almost walked straight into Doomsmane.

"Ah, if it isn't scarface and Robin Mask's boy," the dragon growled, eying them both over. "I was just looking for the two of you. I have a proposition for you, and I…"

Doomsmane's words slowly trailed off into silence, his lips and nostrils wrinkling up his face as he leaned over Mars.

"Hm, I see," he said gruffly, taking a step back from Mars. "It's like that, is it?"

"We was just goin' for some food," Mars frankly told him.

"Oh really?" Doomsmane sneered, a malicious grin spreading over his scaly face. "Well guess what, boys? There's been a slight change of plan. We're enrolling students for the Academy tonight."

"Maybe we don't wanna enrol dis time around," Mars replied, shrugging his shoulders.

"And maybe you don't have a choice in the matter," Doomsmane snarled. "Enrol now, or die."

Doomsmane swiped a hand at Mars's face, causing him to react in a way that shocked Kevin. Mars dodged the attack, as Kevin had half-expected him to do; but he did not stop at dodging Doomsmane's claws. Mars dropped to the ground, curling over and sheltering his head under his arms. Kevin studied Mars in that position, before slowly looking up at Doomsmane, who grinned as their eyes met.

"Registration is this way," Doomsmane said, holding out an arm down a darkened tunnel.

Kevin nodded his understanding, looking down at Mars again, alarmed to find that he had still not moved from his position cowering on the ground.

"Oh, don't worry about him," Doomsmane assured Kevin. "He does that from time to time. Enjoy the silence, it's the only time he ever stops talking."

Kevin glanced down at Mars one last time, a nagging thought in his mind telling him that he really should offer Mars some assistance; but the look on Doomsmane's face combined with his anger at Mars for getting stoned yet again made him step right over Mars's back and walk down the dark tunnel alone.

As he walked, Kevin felt something inside him go cold. There was a light at the end of the tunnel, and even before he could make out what lay ahead of him, Kevin knew that this was what the DMP was all about.

As he neared the end of the tunnel, the tunnel around him became illuminated by the warm orange glow from the domain he was heading towards, causing jagged black shadows to leap and dance across the stonewalls around him. Kevin tried to keep his head held high as he walked, despite the fact that a small part of him was screaming the obvious at him: only one thing created heat and moving orange light.

Kevin slowed as the tunnel opened up around him, his eyes being naturally drawn upwards as the walls of the interior of the mountain stretched away from him in every direction. He was in a large hollow, deep within the heart of the mountain. All around him, the ground was littered with jagged rock formations that stretched up to dizzying heights and deep dark crevices that fell away into infinity. Hanging from the walls and rocks were racks of tools of torture, most of which were broken and blood-stained. Near the centre of the large hollow, a standard DMP training ring had been erected, complete with barbed wire ropes and steel wool ring mat.

Next to the ring the ground fell away in a large circular shape, across which someone had placed a thick log embedded with deadly spikes. From the depths of the crevasse rose curling streams of grey smoke and the occasional spurt of steam, which rose sharply after each of the hissing and popping sounds from below. Kevin did not need to move any closer to the ravine to know that a pool of lava fermented at the bottom of it.

Between the fiery pool of lava, the tools of torture, the harsh terrain, the vicious wrestling ring and the stench of pain and death, what lay before Kevin looked to be the epitome of hell itself. It looked liked the home of devils and demons, and indeed it was, only not of the variety Kevin had been taught about at school or read about in biblical texts. This awful place was the home to the Devil Chojins of the DMP. This awful place was the most talked of and most feared place in the known universe.

This awful place was The Academy.

"Hey Kev."

Kevin turned to his side, frowning as he saw Mars standing clutching his stomach, his shoulders hunched over.

"Mars," he greeted him.

"You know, Doomsmane is just a bastard," Mars replied, lifting his head to survey his surroundings.

Kevin paused, his frown deepening as he saw that Mars's complexion had paled, making his dilated pupils look all the more vivid by contrast. As he looked around himself, the orange glow of the flame torches on the walls caused the shadows of Mars's features to jerk and shudder over his face, making him look positively mad.

"Mars, are you going to throw up?" Kevin bluntly asked him. "Because if you are, please make sure you turn away from me before you do it this time, alright?"

"I hate him…" Mars muttered, his eyes narrowing.

"Doomsmane?" Kevin asked.

"Yeah."

"Well, what are you two waiting for?" Doomsmane snapped, marching up behind Kevin and Mars. "Get on with it, I don't have all day!"

"Right," Kevin agreed, unsure of exactly what it was that he was meant to be doing.

Doomsmane shoved roughly past Mars, marching onwards towards the ring. Kevin turned to Mars for an explanation, but Mars was clutching his shoulder where Doomsmane had crashed into him, and baring his teeth at the dragon's back.

"I hate it when dey call me scarface," he mumbled.

Kevin really was not terribly interested in just why Mars hated being called scarface, but he rather suspected that Mars wished to be quizzed upon the matter. Kevin had assumed that Mars disliked the name because it drew attention to the fact that Mars's face was less than perfect, and his arrogance dictated that he was a perfect man in every way.

"Why?" Kevin asked, trying his best to sound genuinely interested in Mars's plight.

"Huh?" Mars asked, his eyes still fixed on Doomsmane.

"Why do you hate it when people call you scarface?" Kevin asked.

"Because it's what he made me," Mars darkly replied.

"Because it's what he made you, right…"

"When I came to join da DMP, dat dragon fuck did dis to me."

Kevin watched Mars as he drew the index finger of one hand down each of the scars under his eyes in turn.

"Doomsmane did that to you?" Kevin asked.

"Dat's right," Mars agreed, nodding his head.

"And why would he do that?"

"Because it was da only to keep me here."

Kevin began to nod his head, but quickly stopped himself. Why was he even pretending to understand what Mars was talking about? Was this something genuine, or was this just another of Mars's drug-induced orations, the result of which would inevitably be Mars on his back on the ground laughing hysterically at Kevin's naivety? Or was this a genuine glimpse into Mars's soul?

"I'll explain outside," Mars whispered. "But first we gotta go register for Da Academy."

Mars started towards the ring, leaving a dazed Kevin standing alone behind him. Kevin hurriedly shook his head, trying to shake his thoughts into some sort of logical semblance, before hurrying after Mars.

"You know the score, scarface," Doomsmane said through a yawn as they stopped in front of the DMP Legend. "And I'm sure you can fill your friend in."

Mars solemnly nodded his head, his hands curling into fists at his sides.

"Follow me, Kev," he said quietly, walking around the rock Doomsmane had sat down onto.

Kevin obediently followed Mars to the ring, climbing in behind him. Kevin looked around himself, scratching at the back of his iron helmet in confusion. Was he meant to fight Mars to earn himself a place in The Academy?

"Everybody into the ring!" Doomsmane yelled. "The last twelve standing can proceed to tomorrow morning's lessons."

Kevin watched as a hoard of DMP recruits emerged from the shadows of the cave, advancing towards the ring.

"It's okay, Kev," Mars assured him. "It ain't like we ain't never beat dose guys before."

"I guess so…" Kevin muttered warily. "I suppose all we have to do is just fight it out."

* * *

Amy gathered up her notebook and pens, before stretching her arms above her head. The horizon was glowing to the East, indicating that the sun would soon begin to rise. Deciding that this was a good sign that she had stayed outside the DMP headquarters for far too long that night, Amy got to her feet and started to leave.

However Amy came to an abrupt halt after just a few steps as she sighted Mars running up the side of the hill almost directly towards her. She froze, panicking that he was coming for her; but he appeared to be looking down at the ground rather than at her, and so she quickly dove down behind a large boulder, tucking herself down low to the ground to avoid being seen.

Mars ran right past her hiding place, stopping a short way beyond it. He paused there, before spinning around, his eyes narrowed. Amy held her breath, the angered and intense look on his face sending a fresh wave of fear through her. Confronting Mars back in the city was one thing, but confronting him at the DMP headquarters, where he was surrounded by his evil brethren was quite another thing altogether.

"What do you want?" Mars demanded.

Amy stiffened; was he talking to her?

"You won the challenge, what is wrong with you?" a voice shouted back.

Amy turned to see Kevin Mask walking up the hillside towards Mars.

"I don't wanna be nowhere near Doomsmane right now, capisce?" Mars snapped.

"Yes, I know, you don't like Doomsmane, you've told me that already, many, many time and–"

"I hate Doomsmane! And oneday, Im'a kill dat son of a bitch!"

Mars shot a fist at a nearby tree, snapping it in half.

"He is very irritating," Kevin conceded as he neared Mars.

"He took my life from me, I gotta return da favour," Mars muttered.

"Yes, you said something about that earlier," Kevin replied. "You said he was the one who marked your face?"

"Dat's right."

Mars turned to face Kevin, slowly walking up to him.

"And he scarred me, see?" Mars added, pointing at the scars on his face.

"Yes, I can see that," Kevin agreed.

"Cause I ain't got no other scars, Kevin," Mars insisted.

"I'm sure you don't."

"I don't. I ain't never done nothing dishonourable before den, and I ain't never done nothing dishonourable since den, neither."

"Dishonourable?"

"Yeah."

Kevin slowly nodded his head.

"You understand?" Mars asked him.

Kevin hesitated to respond, before slowly shaking his head.

"No," he confessed. "I'm rather afraid I don't understand, Mars."

"Well, see, I got super fast healin' abilities, yeah?" Mars began. "Anybody can do anything to me, and I can recover. You could cut me wid a knife, and by tomorrow, nobody would know what you did."

"Okay, I'm with you," Kevin said, nodding his head.

"I always heal, and I ain't never left wid no scars," Mars continued.

"Alright."

"But dere's a catch."

"I thought there must be."

"My healing powers are a gift from my people. It's kinda more like a curse dan a gift, if you ask me, cause it ain't a perfect ability. I can only heal wounds dat I suffered honourably. Any wounds I suffered dishonourably can't never be healed."

"I see."

"When I first came here, I was just a kid. I wanted to be in da DMP cause it sounded so cool to be one of da bad boys. But Doomsmane said I was just lookin' for some fun, and he didn't trust me not to leave when I got bored. So he said he had to do somethin' to make sure I didn't never go back home. He said if I wanted to join da DMP, I had to let him do it. And I did. I wanted to be one of da bad boys, which is dishonourable, and he ripped his claws down my face to induct me into da DMP. I hate what he did to me, cause he was right. I didn't wanna stay here. I wanna go home. But I can't. My scars say I did somethin' dishonourable, and cause dey're on my face, I can't even hide what I did."

"And now he calls you scarface."

"Dat's right, da sick, fuckin' bastard."

"That's awful. Where is home for you?"

"I don't wanna talk about dis shit no more. I need food. Now."

Mars marched off, heading up the hill. Kevin tilted his head as he watched Mars leave obviously thinking the same thing as Amy; where did Mars expect to find food at the top of the desolate mountain?

* * *

 **Next Chapter:** Mars and Kevin Mask commence their training at The Academy, where their relationship takes a downward spiral thanks to the interference of a bitter and vengeful younger brother and an angry and righteous young woman. **Chapter 8 – The Betrayal**.


	8. The Betrayal

**Disclaimer:** As before.

 **Recap:** Kevin and Mars enrolled for the DMP training school, The Academy, and Mars told Kevin where he got the two scars on his face from and why he hates being called "scarface".

* * *

 **Chapter 8 – The Betrayal**

Mars sighed, grabbing up a towel and roughly rubbing it over his sweat-soaked face. He was beginning to suspect that Doomsmane was deliberately being harder on him than he was on any of the other eleven students in The Academy. In fact, Mars even believed that Doomsmane's untimely blast of fire had been aimed at him, and only by pure luck had it missed and killed the Chojin behind him instead. And, Mars thought to himself, the spiked iron ball that had "accidentally" fallen into the ring during his one on one bout with a fellow student had surely been Doomsmane's work too.

But all the old dragon had succeeded in doing was to kill two of the trainees unnecessarily, increasing Mars's chances of passing; not that he had ever failed.

Mars froze, his face still buried in the towel draped over his hands. He sensed that someone had joined him in the small recess he had retired to to clean himself up, and as he felt something touch his back between his shoulderblades, he realised that he was not wrong. Mars stiffened as he felt a finger press into his skin, slowly moving down the length of his spine. Mars lifted his head from his hands, his pupils shrinking and his muscles tensing as the pressure of the finger neared the base of his spine.

"Geddoff me, Eddie!" he roared, spinning around.

Edward grabbed back his hand as though he had been burned by Mars, blinking up at the Mars innocently.

"I told you before kid, I don't swing dat way, so you better keep your dirty little hands to yourself, understand?" Mars growled down at him.

"It's always the same with you, Mars," Edward sighed. "You blow hot and cold, and I never know where I stand or what to think of you. Do you know, I might just be angry at you if you weren't so dashing–"

"Don't call me dat!" Mars snapped. "Don't call me nothin' but my name, got it? I ain't your boyfriend. Not now, not ever, capisce?"

"You weren't always this hostile with me, Mars," Edward said slyly.

"Hey, don't you go talkin' about dat, Eddie, dat was a long time ago, and I was very drunk, remember?"

"Oh I remember it alright. You were–"

"You know, now dat da DMP has Kevin Mask, I don't really think dat dey need you no more, Eddie. It would be kinda sad if somethin' bad happened to you, wouldn't it?"

"You were very bad that night–"

"I didn't lay a hand on you."

"You didn't have to use your hands."

"Don't go twistin' my words on me, kid!"

"I wonder what my father would say if he knew what we did."

"He wouldn't say nothin', cause we didn't do nothin'."

"I wonder what my brother would say…"

"You better not say a word of dis to Kevin, you got me? If I catch you doin' dat, I'ma kill you, you little bastard!"

"I love it when you talk dirty, Marsy Baby–"

"Fuck off!"

Mars punched Edward in the gut, although he found himself again unable to use as much strength as he would have liked to have to deliver the blow. Deep down in his conscience, a small, nagging voice always soberly reminded him that Edward was still a child, that Edward was much weaker than him and that it was dishonourable to attack when he had such unfair advantages.

"Little bastard…" Mars grumbled, throwing his towel at Edward and stomping away from him.

Behind him, Mars could have sworn that he heard Edward sniffing dramatically at his dirty towel, the very thought of which sent a shiver of disgust down his spine. Mars quickened his pace, heading back through the network of underground tunnels to his one place of refuge, his own cave.

Once there, Mars continued on to the mouth of the cave, walking out into the night air, drawing in a deep breath of the cold air around him before sighing it out slowly. A small noise behind him made him hesitate, but he dismissed it as another bout of paranoia. He had heard a lot of unusual things lately, he was certain that it was just his imagination.

But then Mars remembered that he had not touched any alcohol or any narcotics for the past two days, and so anything he did see or hear now was totally real, and not just the result of some drug-induced illusion.

Another small sound alerted Mars to the exact whereabouts of his stalker. Smirking to himself, Mars bent his knees, squatting down low, before leaping up into the air. He flew up high, his eyes fixing onto a shadow moving low along the ground above his cave.

"Swallow Tail," he growled, dropping down towards the shadow, his coat-tails spiked and hardened and ready to attack behind him.

Mars started as he heard a girl's voice screaming in shock as his Swallow Tail sheared through the material of a long coat. He turned as his tail pierced into the ground, his eyes momentarily meeting those of a face he was certain that he had seen before somewhere. The girl screamed again, dropping something and quickly removing her coat. After successfully slipping from her big dark coat – apparently the only part of her Mars had managed to stab – she grabbed up her dropped items and started to run away.

"Oh, I don't think so," Mars said darkly, tugging his tail from the ground and bounding after her.

Mars caught up with the girl effortlessly, grabbing his arms around her waist from behind and hoisting her up in the air. She screamed again, her shrill tone dulling Mars's ears.

"Ah quit your screechin', bitch!" he groaned, before throwing her roughly to one side.

She groaned loudly as she fell on her side, lying in a daze for a moment as she was momentarily winded by the impact of her fall. Once she had recovered, she glanced up at Mars, the whites of her eyes glowing at him through the darkness as her eyes widened in fear. She quickly turned over and tried to crawl away from him on her elbows, but Mars stepped forwards and grabbed a hand into the waistband of her jeans, pulling her back.

"You ain't goin' nowhere, toots," he warned her.

Mars continued to pull slowly upwards, forcing her to scramble to her feet. Once she was standing Mars yanked her back, grabbing one of her arms with his other hand and releasing her jeans to pull her around in front of himself.

"I should have known it would be you," he groaned as he recognised the girl's face at last. "You're dat obnoxious little bitch from High Park, ain't ya?"

"Maybe," she squeaked, struggling against Mars's grip. "You better let go of me, or I'm gonna call the police!"

"You're gonna call da police, huh?" Mars drawled sarcastically. "And what are you gonna say to da police, huh? You think you can just tell da police dat you just found da DMP headquarters after 28 years?"

"I haven't "just" found the DMP headquarters, you arrogant fuck!" she retorted indignantly. "I found you seven weeks ago!"

"You mean you followed us back from High Park?" Mars asked in disbelief.

"I followed you back from The Palace," she corrected him.

"The Palace, huh?"

"Look Mars, could you at least not squeeze my arm so hard? You're cutting off the blood supply to my hand, you selfish prick!"

"You know my name?"

"Yeah, and I know your friend's name too. Kevin Mask?"

"You know Kevin?"

"Yeah!"

"And who are you?"

"Your worst nightmare!"

"Tough talk for a pencil-necked little girl. What's your name?"

"I'm not telling you!"

"You know my name, it's only fair dat you tell me yours!"

"Says who?"

"Just tell me your name already."

"Amy. My name's Amy."

"Dere now, was dat so hard?"

"Will you let go of me now?"

"I'll think about it."

"You are such an obnoxious, arrogant, sick, twisted–"

"I've got a headache, sweetheart, so can it wid your screechy voice already. What's dat you got dere anyways?"

Amy looked down at the notebook cradled in her arm, glancing over it before turning to look up into Mars's eyes.

"What, you was serious?" he snorted, grabbing the book from her effortlessly and holding it up high in the air out of her reach. "Unless of course dis is your secret journal."

Mars released Amy to open the book in the air above his head, looking up at the pages of writing. Amy leapt towards him, driving a fist into his gut. Mars frowned down at her as she withdrew her hand, shaking it and hissing in pain.

"Dumb bitch," he muttered, turning back to her book to read on.

"Dumb bastard, more like!" Amy growled, before kicking the heel of one foot into Mars's groin.

Her notebook fell to the ground as Mars's face contorted in pain. He slowly moved his hands over his groin, doubling over as a sweat broke out over his face.

"You're going down, Devil Chojin," Amy sighed as she retrieved her book. "And I'm going to be the one to put you there."

Mars snarled out something incomprehensible through his tightly clenched teeth at Amy, but she merely grinned in response, turning on her heel. As she strutted off, Mars started after her, only to double over again, nursing his wound.

"Man, I hate dat girl…" he grumbled.

* * *

Kevin Mask skidded to a halt ungracefully as the sound of sobbing drew his attention to the figure sat hunched over on a rock in one of the shadowy recesses of The Academy. As Kevin recognised the boy as his own brother Edward, he rolled his eyes, at first dismissing Edward's whimpering as yet another dramatic attempt to gain himself more attention; but as he started to walk closer to his younger brother, Kevin began to suspect that this was something far more serious. Edward seemed to be genuinely distraught, and however annoying and wrong he may be, Edward was still Kevin's baby brother, and Kevin still felt duty-bound to tend to him in times of need.

"Edward?' he said softly, stopping in front of him.

"Go away," Edward sobbed, burying his masked face into his hands.

"What's wrong, Edward?" Kevin asked. "Why are you crying?"

"You wouldn't understand!" Edward wailed.

"Try me," Kevin insisted.

"Well, I was just…"

Edward looked up at Kevin, their eyes meeting for a brief moment, a silence passing between them.

"I can't!" Edward wailed, dropping his head back into his hands. "You won't believe me, you won't understand, and you'll just think that I'm being stupid!"

Kevin sighed quietly, before clearing his throat awkwardly. Edward had always been the sort of child who relished physical contact, and Kevin knew that his brother was probably waiting for him to hug him reassuringly; but Kevin had never found physical intimacy an easy issue, least of all with any of his own family, most of whom he hated the very sight of.

"Why don't you just tell me and we'll see what I think then," Kevin suggested, slowly moving over to sit down next to his brother, keeping a small distance between them to avoid any confusion.

"It's about…" Edward began awkwardly, sniffling as he spoke. "It's about a friend of yours."

"A friend of mine?" Kevin echoed. "But I don't have any friends. Unless of course you mean Pumpinator or Dial Bolic, but they're not really my friends, they're just the men who brought me here. I still train with them from time to time, but–"

"I'm talking about Mars, you stupid fuck!"

Kevin stiffened, a sickening sensation crawling over his skin.

"Mars?" he said slowly, watching Edward from the corner of his eye.

"Yes, Mars!" Edward snapped. "He… He did things to me. He still… Does things to me. I don't know what to do, Kevin."

Kevin swallowed hard, the sickening feeling moving into his stomach.

"What sort of "things"?" he asked reluctantly.

"He touches me," Edward quietly replied. "He always has done. Since the day he kidnapped me."

"Right…" Kevin sighed. "He touches you without your consent?"

Edward turned sharply to look straight at Kevin, his shock evident even though his features were hidden by his trademark Mask family helmet.

"He rapes me!" Edward screamed.

Kevin slowly turned his head to look directly at his brother, eying him over thoughtfully. Although Edward had not always been aware of his presence, Kevin had tried to attend as many of Edward's practise sessions as possible since joining the DMP. During that time, he had noticed several things for himself, and had been told about many more.

"Edward, I know you're too young to be…" Kevin began, before clearing his throat awkwardly as a mental block prevented him from using the words that he needed to. "To be… You're too young to be in a serious relationship with anyone, but Edward I'm not stupid. I've seen the way you look at Mars. You can't stay away from him, you can't keep your eyes off of him, and I have no doubt that, behind closed doors, you probably can't even keep your hands off of him. And I know that the only reason you have been so hostile towards me since I joined the DMP is because you are scared that I will steal him away from you. Let me assure you right now Edward, I am not, I never have been, and I never will be a homosexual. If you want to pursue a relationship with Mars, then please, don't let me stop you. Just be warned that I don't think Mars is that way inclined."

"See, I knew you wouldn't understand!" Edward wailed. "He takes advantage of me, Kevin, he always has! He told me that if I didn't let him do it, he would kill you! I did it all for you, Kevin! The night he kidnapped me, he was going to kill you then, it was his order from the DMP, to kill Robin Mask's eldest son, but I begged him not to. I had to give myself to him to make him stop, Kevin! He's going to kill you Kevin, he won't let you graduate from The Academy! I'm doing this for you, Kevin, but it's killing me!"

The debilitating sensations of guilt and doubt began to take hold of Kevin's mind with every word his younger brother uttered. Mars had never spoken much about Edward, and had, in fact, avoided talking about him altogether in most circumstances when Kevin had mentioned him. Did Mars have something to hide after all?

Kevin slowly reached out a hand to Edward's shoulder, wincing as a clear and sickening image of his father appeared in his mind. Edward lunged towards Kevin, throwing his arms around Kevin's waist and crying into his chest. Kevin closed his eyes, deciding that the only way to get a definite answer was to confront Mars for himself. Thanks to the training they had undergone at The Academy, Kevin knew for a fact that, at that particular moment in time, Mars was as clean as he had ever been – possibly in his entire life – as he had not touched any mind-altering drugs of any kind for over two days.

"Wait here, Edward, I'll be back," Kevin said firmly, pulling his brother's arms from his body and rising to his feet.

"Where are you going, Kevin?" Edward asked him.

"Just wait here," Kevin darkly replied, before marching off in the direction he had last seen Mars heading.

Kevin was certain that Mars had returned to his place of refuge – his unusual little cave that opened out onto the side of the mountain. Kevin quickened his pace as he drew nearer and nearer to the cave, breaking into a run as the entrance came into sight. He ran into the cave, glanced around himself, and then ran on out onto the hillside.

Kevin looked up and down the hill, but saw nothing. He sighed in frustration, but as he looked down at the bare mud by his feet, he saw the distinct imprints of Mars's enormous feet, and they appeared to be heading down the hillside.

"Got you," Kevin muttered, jogging down the hill.

In his blind determination to catch Mars, Kevin did not see something hurry out of the trees and stumble into his path until it was too late to stop himself. He let out a groan as he collided with someone much smaller than he was, who began to fall over from the force of the impact. Kevin instinctively grabbed the person's arms to stop them from falling, looking down at the face staring back up at him.

"You!" he blurted tactlessly. "What the devil are you doing here?"

"My coat. Mars tore my coat, I want it back!"

Kevin opened his mouth to respond, only to stop himself again.

"Amy, isn't it?" he asked quietly.

"Never mind my name, I want my coat back!" she stubbornly replied.

"What are you doing here?" Kevin demanded.

"What does it look like I'm doing here?" she snapped.

"Do you have any idea how dangerous a place this is? If you were caught lingering around here by anyone other than me, you would be dead by now!"

"Mars didn't kill me."

"Mars? Mars came this way? Wait just a minute, how do you know his name is Mars?"

"I want my coat."

"What's that?"

"What's what?"

Kevin sighed as Amy tucked her arms behind her back, concealing her possessions from his view as she looked up at him with wide, innocent eyes.

"Do you have any idea what this place is?" he asked her quietly.

"This place is the place where the DMP have been hiding out for the last 28 years," she calmly replied. "This is the DMP headquarters."

"That's correct," Kevin said, nodding his head. "And this place is crawling with Devil Chojins, who would gladly rape you, murder you slowly and painfully and then eat your remains for breakfast. Either you are very, very stupid, or very, very brave."

"I'm not stupid!"

"But apparently you do possess a reckless abandon, and have no desire to live long enough to see another day in this world."

"I'm just standing up for what I believe in!"

"Look, which way did Mars go?"

"Down the hill."

"Thank you. Now get yourself away from this place before you get caught."

Kevin released Amy and walked off down the mountainside again. Amy watched him for a moment, before glancing back up the slope at the point where her coat lay, where Mars had speared it into the ground. She sighed, turning back to watch Kevin's back.

"I don't like you, Kevin Mask," she called after him. "But I'm going to do you a really big favour. You won't catch Mars, he took your bike."

"He did what?" Kevin yelped, staggering to a halt and turning around to look back up the hill at her.

"He took your bike," she repeated.

"The bastard! But I have to catch him, this is extremely important. It's absolutely imperative that I talk with him as soon as possible."

"Well you're never going to catch him on foot!"

"And have you got any better ideas, Miss Know-it-all?"

Amy looked down at the bulge in her jean pocket where her keys resided, chewing at her bottom lip thoughtfully as she weighed up her options.

"Well, if you're stupid enough to run after him, don't let me stop you," she called down the hill, before marching back up to where her coat lay.

"Irritating, irksome, conniving, conspiring little bitch…" Kevin muttered as he carried on down the hill. "I don't know which one annoys me more: her, Mars or bloody Edward…"

* * *

 **Next Chapter:** Kevin grows increasingly suspicious of Mars, and the two begin to hate each other following a task they are set by The Academy that results in both men losing another shred of their dignity. **Chapter 9 – A Dishonourable Deed**.


	9. A Dishonourable Deed

**A/N:** Getting towards the end of this fic. I hope this fic has been informative and helpful as a history of the DMP, Kevin and Mars. I also hope this has helped tie up some loose ends in _The Reason_ regarding Edward and Kevin and Mars's problems with each other.

 **Recap:** Edward told big brother Kevin that Mars rapes him, is this the reason for Edward's erratic behaviour, or is Edward lying to cause more problems between Kevin and Mars?

* * *

 **Chapter 9 – A Dishonourable Deed**

Kevin kicked his foot at a nearby rock, glowering around the eight other Academy trainees around him. Doomsmane was on his way to set their tasks for the day, and Mars was still yet to arrive. Kevin had not been able to locate Mars since talking to Edward the day before about the nature of the relationship his younger brother shared with Mars, and Kevin was anxious to hear Mars's side of the story. So anxious, he had not slept or ate, and he felt lethargic, his desire to learn the truth being the only thing that kept him on his feet.

"Girls, your task for today is a simple one, you'll all be glad to hear," Doomsmane announced as he approached the group. "And you'll also be glad to hear that today, you only have one task to complete."

Doomsmane stopped in front of the group, slowly scanning over each of their faces in turn. Despite a dragon's mouth looking nothing at all like a human's mouth, Kevin could still make out that Doomsmane was silently mouthing out numbers as he counted through the nine students facing him.

"I had twelve students at the start of our term, and I have only had two casualties," he growled. "So then why do I only see nine faces here today? Who is missing?"

Kevin waited for Doomsmane to check over their faces one more time, watching with a degree of interest as the dragon's eyes widened briefly, before he recovered with a sly smirk.

"I see scarface has overslept again," he sighed. "But never mind, we shall began without him. If he fails to turn up before the end of today's task, he will be failed, and he will have to wait until next term for another chance to become an elite warrior of the DMP."

Kevin had not expected Doomsmane to return with such a response to Mars's absence. He was so taken aback by Doomsmane's lack of concern, Kevin did not realise that Skulldozer was issuing them all with instructions for their next task, whilst lower-ranking trainees were dragging chains attached to blocks of concrete towards them. Kevin just continued to stare at Doomsmane, mouthing out the word "but" as he tried to think of a suitable counter argument to Doomsmane's newfound flippancy. However, due to Kevin's mask hiding his mouth from view, Doomsmane failed to notice Kevin's distress, instead turning his back on Kevin and all the other trainees, his hands tucked behind his back as he slowly walked away from them.

"What the devil–?" Kevin yelped as his left ankle was suddenly grabbed roughly and yanked upwards.

Kevin fell silent as he staggered to maintain his balance on one foot, frowning down at the two young DMP recruits who were in the process of locking a chain around his ankle. Kevin briefly wondered if he should be attempting to fight them off, but a quick glance around his fellow students informed him that their next task apparently required them to have a concrete block chained to each of their ankles.

Kevin rolled his eyes as he sighed inwardly. He was beginning to regret letting his thoughts of Mars and Edward distract him. As the two men released his left ankle and moved their way around to his right, Kevin watched one of his fellow pupils walk away from the group, dragging the blocks behind him as he went. A wave of nausea washed over Kevin as he watched the man walk towards the giant crater, stopping by the edge of the spiked log that spanned the length of it.

"Oh please God no…" Kevin muttered as his felt his right foot being returned to solid ground.

The man removed his shirt, tossing it aside before stepping onto the end of the log. Kevin gulped as the Chojin bent over, grasping the log with each hand and then carefully dropped his legs over each side of the log. Kevin winced as one of the man's legs hovered over the point of one of the spikes. The man began to panic as he saw this for himself, and tried to adjust his position before injuring himself.

"Take this, you bastard!" a voice yelled.

"Edward, no!" Kevin yelled, reaching a hand out as his younger brother drop-kicked the concrete block attached to the man's leg over the edge of the crater.

For a split second, all that could be heard in the giant cave that was The Academy was the sound of the chain attached to man's ankle rushing over the edge of the crater. As the weight of the concrete block caught against the man's ankle, his leg was brought down sharply, impaling the spike through his thigh. The scream of agony he let out made Kevin wretch. He forced to fight the urge to vomit, his head buzzing as a dizzy spell passed over him as he saw the next part of the trial.

The man sat on the log was literally pinned to the spot, the spike being a particularly long one, long enough to pierce right through his leg, leaving a small point protruding from the upper side of his thigh. In typical DMP fashion, he was not allowed even a moment to recover; Doomsmane and Skulldozer appeared at either side of the log, poised by the edge of the crater, each with whips in their hands. Kevin clenched his fists and began to count in his head, his sanity beginning to waiver as he watched the two DMP legends beat into the already severely impaired man.

"He can't even escape, he's stuck to the log, this is awful!" Kevin muttered out loud.

"What's the matter, brother?" Edward sneered, skipping over to his brother's side to gloat. "Surely you're not scared, are you? You're not still scared of a bit of fire, are you Kevin? Or maybe it's heights. Maybe the wonderful Kevin Mask has a little fear of heights. Is that it?"

Kevin turned his head sharply, scowling at his shorter sibling, who was standing by his side, his hands behind his back, rocking back and forth on his heels. Even though his black steel mask covered his features, Kevin knew only too well that Edward was grinning smugly at him.

"Shut your mouth, you ginger bastard!" Kevin snapped irritably.

"I beg your pardon?" Edward echoed, staggered back a step in shock at his brother's rebuttal.

"I said, ginger," Kevin sneered, flicking a gloved hand at the short tuft of auburn hair protruding from one side of Edward's mask. "Shut your mouth. I'd like to see you do a trial like this!"

"Mars told me I don't have to do it," Edward sighed. "Mars told me that once he graduates, he will take over the DMP. He will be king of this castle, and I will be his queen."

"Keep running your mouth like that, and I'll give you a head start in becoming a queen!" Kevin growled, waving a fist at Edward's masked face. "You'll be back in church singing with the ten year old choirboys by the time I'm done with you!"

"You're only saying that because you're so scared. Big, strong Kevin is scared of a little bitty fire. Aw!"

"Fuck off Edward!"

Edward slowly folded his arms across his chest, watching his brother stand before him, breathing so heavily he sounded as though he had just been running for his life.

"I think you need anger management," Edward quietly suggested. "I think you have some issues."

Kevin began to reach for Edward, but a shove in his back forced him to stumble forwards, his attention drawn back to the trial at hand. The man who had been straddling the log with a spike through his leg had disappeared, and there were three students crossing the log, hanging from their hands, their bodies dangling down the from log towards the fiery pit of lava below. A fourth student was in the process of manoeuvring himself over the edge of the log to walk his way across it with his hands, all the while being whipped mercilessly by Doomsmane and Skulldozer.

"Where are all the others?" Kevin asked the man pushing him forwards.

"What others?" the man asked.

"Well, there were eight other students here, but I can only see four now," Kevin explained.

"Funny that, ain't it?" the man chuckled. "A word of advice, kid. The heat of the lava makes your hands hot, and it makes your hands sweat. Try not to slip off the log, yeah?"

"Oh…"

Kevin gulped as the student at the front of the queue began to struggle to maintain his hold of the log. The Chojin behind him let out a scream of dismay as he slid off the log, plummeting to an untimely end, a cloud of smoke hissing up from the lava as he fell in.

"Fucky, fucky, fuck!" Kevin growled, roughly pulling off his gloves and throwing them over his shoulder at Edward. "This is just fucking suicide, this is insane, no-one could possible survive this shit, do they want us to die?"

"I know a guy who's passed this trial twice in two months," the man behind Kevin informed him.

"Oh really?" Kevin sneered sarcastically.

"Yeah," the man replied. "Scarface. And if he ever gets here, this'll be time number three."

Kevin slowly nodded his head as he remembered then that Mars had admitted to having already been through the rigours of The Academy two times, and having been failed each time due to personal differences between himself and Doomsmane.

"Well anything scarface can do, Kevin Mask can do better!" Kevin declared, ripping off his black DMP T-shirt and stepping up to the log.

Kevin lost a little of his gusto as he peered over the edge, a wall of hot air ripe with the smell of molten flesh greeting him. Kevin sniffed back his nausea and stepped onto the log, carefully lowering himself into a seated position as he had seen the others do, taking extra care not to skewer his legs onto the log. No sooner had he sat down than a whip bit into his back, the force of the blow causing him to jerk forwards involuntarily.

"Fuck," he muttered.

Kevin decided then that it would be in his best interests to start crossing the log as soon as was humanly possible, and so he quickly swung one leg over to sit side-on, wiping his hands one last time on his thighs to rid his palms of any sweat. As he lowered himself over the edge of the log, Kevin was distracted from even so much as thinking about looking down as he was whipped mercilessly.

"Bastard!" he snarled as Doomsmane began whipping at his hands as he hung from the log. "Sadistic fucking wanker!"

Kevin began to pick his way across the log, the heat of the lava below and the weight of the concrete blocks dangling from his ankles quickly taking their toll. In front of him, Kevin could barely make out the other three students. The other two students. Another had fallen, it seemed. The intense heat from the lava was creating a thick haze in the air, restricting his visibility.

But Kevin did not fail to hear the scream of another student as he fell to his doom.

"This is fucking insanity!" he cried as he struggled onwards. "What use are we to the DMP if we all die doing this stupid task?"

As Kevin neared a third of the way across the log, he became aware of two things: firstly, he was catching up on the last remaining student, who appeared to have stopped entirely, and secondly, the distinct sensation that something was behind him was growing increasingly stronger.

Kevin looked down and around, peeking under his armpit at the log behind him. His first impression was one of sheer horror, as he learned that he was not even halfway across the log, and his hands were sweating profusely, making it almost impossible to keep a grip of the log. His second impression was one that left him feeling a mixture of emotions.

Mars was behind him, picking his way along the log.

Kevin pressed on, trying to keep his head up as he moved. Ahead of him he could see that the other student had indeed stopped, and was looking down at the lava below, sobbing hysterically as his hands slid and grabbed at the log.

"He ain't gonna make it," Mars said.

Kevin almost lost his gip of the log himself in shock; how had Mars managed to catch him up so quickly?

"Looks like it's just gonna be you an' me, Mask," Mars added.

Kevin moved a little further along before stopping again, the man in front of him blocking him from moving any further.

"I don't wanna die!" the man wailed, staring at Kevin and Mars as he slipped and struggled around the log.

"Ah, shut-up and let go already!" Mars yelled at him. "You're blockin' da way for da rest of us, capisce?"

The man screamed desperately as his hands finally slid from the log.

"I never wanted to be a bad guy!" he wailed as he fell towards the lava.

Despite his mind screaming at him not to watch, Kevin could not take his eyes from the defeated Chojin as he fell into the lava far below. The man's body quickly incinerated, his flesh boiling and bubbling around his bones as his charred skeleton was swallowed up in the thick inferno. Kevin shivered involuntarily, a brief image of his mother being engulfed by rubble and flames replaying before his mind's eye.

"I don't think I can do this, Mars," Kevin said.

"Hey, c'mon Mask!" Mars snapped. "You gotta keep goin' now! If you don't move, either along da log or down into da pit, dere ain't no way I can get across! C'mon, Mask! Keep movin', one way or da other!"

"Yes, you're right," Kevin said decisively. "I have to get to the other side. I have to get there, and so do you, Mars."

"Dat's da spirit, Kevin!"

"I have to get to the other side and so do you, because once we get there, I have to kill you for what you've done to my little brother!"

"Say what?"

Kevin struggled on, passing the point where the previous student had just fallen from, Mars following him closely as he went.

"This is such a stupid fucking trial!" Kevin snarled. "It's bad enough to cross a pit of lava on a log using your hands, but to tie concrete fucking blocks to our feet to weight us down as well, and to put great big fucking spikes into the log so we have to calculate where he put our hands next with every move we make, it's so fucking stupid!"

Kevin stopped, every breath he drew shuddering in his chest.

"What are you stoppin' for now, Mask?" Mars yelled at him. "Just stop your yappin', huh? Conserve all dat energy, use it to get your ass across!"

"I can't do this Mars. I can't do it. It's your fault. This is all your fault. You fucking bastard Mars, I hate you!"

"Hey, why is dis my fault?"

"Because you… You… You raped my brother, you sick, twisted–"

"Hey wait just a minute, don't I get da chance to defend myself here?"

"No! I'm about to die, and it's all your fault! I was going to confront the Muscle League. It was going to be me, Pumpinator and Dial Bolic against those miserable do-gooders. I was going to use all the knowledge of the Kinniku fighting techniques that my father taught to me to defeat those bastards, to show my father what he could have been if he hadn't sold out and joined the side of good… But now I can't, and it's all your fault Mars, you fucking arsehole!"

Kevin's sweaty hands slid over the sides of the log, and for a brief moment he felt himself fall towards the steaming pool of lava below, his mind briefly wondering if his death would be quick or if he would feel the intense pain as he melted to death.

But suddenly Kevin's weight caught sharply on his right wrist, the jarring of his halt snapping a tendon in his right shoulder. Kevin opened his eyes, which he had not even realised he had shut, looking down at first, amazed to see himself still hovering above the pit of lava, albeit with his feet slightly closer to the flaming pool than before. Looking up, Kevin saw that Mars was gripping onto his wrist with one hand, his other hand still hanging onto the log.

"What are you… What are you doing, Mars?" Kevin gasped. "We'll both die!"

"Maybe," Mars replied, his voice strained from the effort of holding them both on the log with one hand. "Or maybe not. What was all dat stuff you was just sayin' about da Kinniku fightin' techniques?"

"The Kinniku fighting techniques?" Kevin echoed. "I can't tell you Mars, I swore I would take those secrets to my grave."

"Keep dis shit up, and you might just get your wish, Mask," Mars growled threateningly. "Are you gonna tell me what it is?"

"Are you… Are you going to help me back up?"

"Sure. But you gotta tell me what you know. Cause da truth is Mask, I don't really wanna let you live. Da way I see it, you're da only guy around here who could actually stand a chance of beatin' me, and I don't need no more enemies as strong as you. I want you to know Mask, I'm only doin' dis cause you're gonna tell me about da Kinnikus. And it had better be good, Mask."

"It is, Mars! It's very good! I can tell you how to defeat the Butt Buster!"

"Oh yeah? Yeah, I guess I could save your pathetic little life for information like dat."

"I promise to tell you Mars, just please, don't let go of me! I don't want die like my mother did!"

"Yeah, yeah, I hear ya."

Mars gripped into the log with his left hand and began to pull Kevin up with his right. Kevin grabbed his left arm around Mars's legs, allowing Mars to let go of his right arm. Mars grabbed onto the log with both arms, hoisting himself up, holding himself still while Kevin clambered up his body. As Kevin began to wrap his arms over the top of the log, his sweating palms slipped against the surface of the wood, and Mars quickly reached one arm down, grabbing Kevin's armour and pulling him upwards.

"Oh thank you," Kevin gasped as Mars pulled his body up onto the log. "Thank you so much Mars!"

"Yeah, you just better keep your half of da deal!" Mars growled, rolling over onto his side on the log as he pulled Kevin onto the log next to him. "Cause I ain't no hero, I didn't do dis for nothing', just you remember dat."

"I understand," Kevin agreed.

"Good, cause I don't think I like you no more," Mars added, rolling further over as he helped Kevin up onto the log. "You're nothin' but a squealer, really. You're nothin' but – argh!"

Mars screamed out in pain as he rolled onto a spike in the log, the weight of his body driving the spike through his skin, where it tore through flesh and muscle alike, burying into his lower back.

"Bastard!" Mars cried, grabbing at the log as he tried to lift himself off the spike.

Unfortunately, due to the angle he had rolled onto the spike, the only way for Mars to free himself was for him to tear himself away from the spike, allowing it to create a deep gash through the lower left side of his back.

"You bastard, Mask!" Mars yelled as he eventually freed himself. "What is dis big secret anyways? It had better be good!"

"I'm not telling you until we get across the log," Kevin meekly replied.

"You what?" Mars roared. "I just saved your miserable little life, you ungrateful fuck! You can't back out now! Dat's just plain dishonourable!"

"I don't trust you not to kick me off once I tell you," Kevin confessed. "Let's just get across first, yes?"

"Yeah, right, well, you better hurry yourself up," Mars grumbled. "I'm bleedin' here."

Mars swiped the back of his left hand across the wound in his back, bringing his hand around to show Kevin the results. Kevin watched the thick red blood drip from Mars's fingertips, creating small dark spots on the log between them.

"Move it, squealer!" Mars yelled at him.

"Yes, of course."

Kevin crawled a little way along the log in the hope that it would shorten his trial. A quick glance in both directions told him that he was now just over two thirds of the way across, and the last part of the journey would be much quicker than the first part had been. Feeling a little more positive about the whole situation, Kevin lowered himself off the edge of the log and started across it again, walking his hands along the wood.

Kevin was relieved to find that Doomsmane and Skulldozer were not waiting to whip him as he finally reached the other side. He quickly clambered up onto solid ground, staggering a short distance before falling to his knees, where two young trainees quickly detached the chains from his ankles. Kevin nodded his head politely at the two Devil Chojins before getting to his feet. The urge to remove his mask was overwhelming, but Kevin respected the Mask family tradition of keeping his face concealed from public view.

"Dis way, Mask," Mars barked in his ear.

Kevin turned to see Mars marching off towards a recess in the cave. Despite the severity of the trial they had just endured, Mars was still walking tall and steady, his fists clenched at his sides. Kevin began to wonder if Mars was oblivious to pain, as his bare back was laced with lacerations from the whips and the gouge in his lower back was deeper than Kevin had imagined it would be, and was bleeding profusely over his left hip.

"I hope I never have to face you in the ring, Mars," Kevin muttered.

Kevin started after Mars, his entire body weak and shaky. Walking in a straight line was proving to be an almost impossible task for him as he tried to hold his head up. Ahead of Kevin, Mars was standing in the recess, wiping the sweat from his face and chest with a ragged old towel.

"He's not human," Kevin muttered to himself. "He's a complete freak of nature…"

"So come on, Mask, out wid it," Mars greeted Kevin as he finally reached the recess.

Kevin dropped himself onto a nearby rock, slouching over as exhaustion took him over.

"The Butt Buster," Kevin began weakly. "Isn't a perfect move."

Mars paused, his right arm outstretched in front of himself, his left hand hovering over it with the towel. He slowly moved his golden eyes down to where Kevin sat, his nose twitching irritably.

"What, dat's it?" he asked quietly. "You made me save your life for dat shit?"

"No, there's more," Kevin replied.

"Well, dere had better be, Mask!" Mars added, rubbing roughly at his arm with the towel. "Cause I already know about da imperfections of da Butt Buster. I've already worked out a way to perfect da move. You better have somethin' better for me."

"I know how to reverse the move," Kevin explained.

"Reverse the move?"

Mars dropped the towel, walking over to stand over Kevin.

"I'm listenin'," he said, planting his hands on his hips expectantly.

"In the Butt Buster, the opponent's head is not secured, and as such, they can still escape the move," Kevin explained.

"I know," Mars pressed impatiently.

"And they can turn the move upside-down, using a technique known as the Number Cruncher," Kevin continued. "You just have to slip forwards, grab the attacker's ankles and then turn him around and lock the move in. It reverses the Butt Buster, and effectively you could use the Kinniku's own move against them."

"But dey could just reverse it again, yeah?"

"Not if you secure their head. I thought you said you had already perfected the move?"

"I have, but you best tell me how you would do it too, just to be sure, yeah?"

"Well, you have to devise a way of locking the opponent's head into place somehow. I don't know how, many ways have been tried in the past, but they have all either failed or lessened the strength of the move."

"I got cha. Okay, I can work wid dat I guess. I guess savin' your sorry ass wasn't so bad after all. Hey squealer, ya still wanna kill me?"

"What?"

"Dat's what I thought. Smell ya later, squealer."

Mars sauntered off, leaving Kevin alone to watch him leave.

"Bastard," Kevin growled to himself. "He's so strong and so confident, and he just stole my… And I still don't know what's really going on between him and Edward!"

* * *

Mars glowered over his shoulder at the full-length mirror, baring his fangs as he studied the vicious wound he had been left with after saving Kevin earlier that day. It did not seem to be healing at all, despite the fact that all the other wounds he had endured that day had disappeared long ago.

"That will never heal, scarface."

"Huh?"

Mars turned sharply, dropping into a fighting stance instinctively.

"Mask, is dat you?" he asked, frowning in confusion.

"Yes, it is."

Mars straightened out of his stance, only to curl his top lip in disgust as Edward walked into the shaft of light illuminating the cave.

"What are you doin' here, ya little bastard?" Mars snarled.

"That wound will never heal because you suffered it whilst performing a dishonourable deed," Edward said smugly as he slowly paced towards Mars.

"A dishonourable deed?" Mars yelped. "Hey, I saved your brother's life! What's so dishonourable about dat, huh?"

"You only saved him because you wanted to learn the secret of the Kinniku family move, the Butt Buster," Edward sighed. "Isn't that right?"

"Yeah, so?"

"So that was dishonourable. You shouldn't save a man's life because there is an incentive in it for you. You should do it because it is your duty to your fellow man."

"Ah, shut yer yap!"

"You're just getting angry because you know that I'm right."

Mars turned to the mirror again looking down at the gaping gash in his back. He prodded a finger at it, hissing as a rush of pain shot through his body.

"You know that I'm right, Mars," Edward sneered, stepping into Mars's view in the mirror.

"So what do you suggest I do about it, huh?" Mars snapped at Edward's reflection.

"You could try a spell to reverse the effect," Edward suggested, reaching up a hand to his mask.

Mars frowned, watching in the mirror as Edward removed his mask.

"Hey, what cha doin' kid?" Mars demanded, spinning around to face Edward.

"Helping you," Edward sighed, placing his mask down onto a nearby rock. "Because I love you."

"Hey, I already told you, don't you go talkin' none of dat crap around me, ya hear?" Mars warned him, taking a step back as Edward crept towards him.

"But my love can save you, Mars," Edward insisted, running the fingers of one gloved hand through his rough auburn hair.

"Do me a favour Eddie," Mars groaned, sitting down onto a rock in front of the mirror.

"What's that, my love?" Edward asked, edging closer to Mars.

"Go fuck yourself," Mars snarled.

Edward straightened his back indignantly, watching Mars as he rested his forearms on his knees, his head drooping down until the top of his headdress was pointing directly at the mirror in front of him. Mars let out a sigh of despair, bringing a smile to Edward's face. Edward slid closer to Mars's side, running his fingers over the bloody, fleshy gash on Mars's back.

"Hey, what da fuck do you think you're doin', huh?" Mars yelled, swiping a hand at Edward.

Edward dodged out of Mars's reached, walking around to Mars's right side. Mars turned around to look up at him, glaring at him questioningly.

"What would you do if I told you that I could heal that wound in your back right here, right now?" Edward whispered.

"I'd say dat I'm listenin', but if I find out dat you're shittin' me, I'ma kill you," Mars frankly replied.

"Good," Edward replied with a grin. "Because there is a way to heal that wound. You just need a kiss from one who loves you. But that person must be an innocent. Like me."

"Okay, first off, Eddie, you ain't no innocent," Mars said. "Second, you ain't kissin' any part of me. And third, you oughta be countin' your lucky stars dat I don't slit your little neck and hang you from da ceilin' by your testicles for tryin' dat shit on me. Now get outta my sight, ya hear?"

"Alright, if you say so. Pity really. I could have helped you heal all your scars…"

Edward started to walk away, leaving Mars staring at his own reflection in bewilderment.

"Hey, Eddie, what did you just say?" he yelled, turning away from the mirror.

"I said," Edward began, spinning on his heels to face Mars. "I can heal all your scars."

"All of dem?" Mars asked suspiciously as Edward slowly made his way back towards him.

"Every single one, scarface," Edward whispered, lighting drawing a finger down each of the scars under Mars's eyes.

Mars slowly turned back to the mirror as Edward removed his gloves behind him.

"Just imagine, no-one would ever call you scarface again," Edward whispered, reached his arms around Mars's shoulders from behind.

Mars watched his reflection in the mirror as Edward placed a finger from each hand over each of the deep red lines under his eyes.

"I could go home…" Mars whispered.

"Yes," Edward agreed. "All you have to do it let me kiss you."

Edward pulled his hands away from Mars's face, revealing his scars once more to the mirror.

"I just gotta let you kiss me?" Mars asked slowly. "Dat's all?"

"That's all," Edward agreed, nodding his head.

Mars narrowed his eyes at Edward's reflection, the glint in Edward's emerald eyes arousing his suspicions.

"Where?" he asked quietly.

"Hm?" Edward asked.

"Where do I gotta let you kiss me?" Mars asked.

"Well, how about right here in this cave?" Edward suggested.

"No, dumbass!" Mars groaned, dragging a hand over his face. "I meant where! Where on my body! Do you gotta kiss da scars?"

"No, I have to kiss you on the lips," Edward replied.

"On da lips?"

Mars screwed up his face in disgust, gulping audibly.

"I don't gotta…" he began awkwardly, lowering his gold eyes to the ground. "I mean, I don't gotta use my tongue or nothin', right?"

"Only if you want to, darling," Edward replied, leaning over Mars.

"No!" Mars yelled, reaching up both hands in front of his face.

Edward shrugged his shoulders, pacing around Mars's back. Mars slowly stood up, clearing his throat and shrugging his shoulders.

"Okay, I'm ready," he said, turning to Edward as he stopped by his side.

"No you're not," Edward replied. "You have to remove your headdress first."

"My headdress?" Mars asked, touching a hand to his headdress. "Why? I can't just take it off like dat! Da Mask of Madness is da most powerful offensive tool known to da wrestling community, I gotta be careful what I do wid it!"

"Just take it off, scarface."

Mars sighed, grumbling something inaudible as he reluctantly pulled his headdress off, gently placing it down on the rock next to Edward's black mask.

"You better not be lyin', kid," he growled as he turned to the mirror, smoothing back his bright red hair with both hands.

"You hair is your pride and joy, isn't it Mars?" Edward asked, gazing up at Mars lovingly.

"Yeah, well, I'm a good-lookin' guy, and my hair is one of my best features," Mars casually replied, smiling at his reflection.

"That's right Mars, you are a very attractive man," Edward enthused. "And your hair is so gorgeous, I could just run my hands through it all day long. You really should take your headdress off more often, you look so damn sexy without it–"

"Hey, keep it in your pants, Eddie!" Mars snapped, rounding on Edward. "Now what do I gotta do next?"

"Nothing," Edward replied. "We just have to kiss."

"And all my scars will disappear?" Mars asked.

"Yes."

"Okay."

Mars started to lean towards Edward, pausing as he saw Edward close his eyes and pout his lips up at him.

"Wait a minute, how do you know dis is even gonna work?" Mars demanded, straightening up again.

"Because my father once told me," Edwards hurriedly replied. "He learnt it from some guy he knew from the Muscle League, or something."

"Okay, yeah, dat makes sense I guess."

Mars leaned over, clenching and unclenching his fists at his sides as he fought back his repulsion at the sight of Edward waiting for his kiss.

"Ah, fuck it!" he muttered, moving forwards and closing the gap between them.

Edward quickly grabbed handfuls of Mars's hair at the back of his head, holding Mars's head in place as he opened his mouth against Mars's lips. Mars's eyes snapped open, panic gripping him for a brief moment, paralysing him from defending himself as Edward tried to slip his tongue between his lips.

"What the fuck is going on in here?"

Mars grabbed Edward's shoulders and ripped the boy from his body, shoving him roughly aside, growling in frustration as he saw that Edward was clutching two handfuls of his precious scarlet hair. Mars leaned back to check his reflection, his eyes widening in shock at what he saw.

"Lyin' little bastard!" he roared, kicking through the mirror with one large, booted foot.

A large hand grabbed Mars's shoulder, pulling him roughly around. Mars paused as he locked eyes with Kevin Mask, words escaping him as an eerie yellow glow began to illuminate Kevin's form.

"Bastard!" Kevin snarled, punching Mars hard in the jaw.

Mars staggered back, touching a hand to his mouth.

"Hey, your little brother tricked me!" Mars defended himself.

"Die, bastard!" Kevin yelled, throwing himself at Mars.

Edward screamed as Kevin and Mars fell to the ground, rolling over each other, punching and kicking at each other with a level of ferocity that even the DMP would be proud of. A short way into their brawl, Doomsmane and Edward's two friends rushed into the cave. Edward's friends grabbed one of Kevin's arms each and dragged him off of Mars, who quickly leapt to his feet. Doomsmane swiped a hand at Mars's face, causing Mars to cower back, screaming out in fear.

"Pathetic," Doomsmane snorted. "Save the bitch-fighting for tomorrow, girls."

Doomsmane looked over at Kevin, who ceased his struggling, allowing Edward's two associates to hold him back.

"Take him out of here," Doomsmane ordered.

The dragon Chojin waited until Kevin had disappeared from sight before turning to Mars, who was still cowering back, his head sheltered by his arms. Doomsmane shook his head, grabbing up Mars's headdress and throwing it over to him.

"And you, try to keep your hormones in check," he grumbled.

Mars slowly lifted his arms from his head, reaching a shaking hand down to where his headdress had landed at his feet. Doomsmane turned to Edward, who was clutching his black mask at his chest. As their eyes met, Edward dropped his mask to the stone floor, the clang resounding throughout the cave.

"And as for you, you miserable little fag, stay away from my students, understand?" Doomsmane growled at Edward.

"Y-yes, Sir!" Edward stuttered.

Doomsmane turned and marched out of the cave. Edward grabbed up his mask, glancing over at Mars, who was in the process of replacing his headdress. Mars slowly moved his eyes to Edward's, a scowl darkening his features.

"I'ma get you for dis, Edward Mask," he growled.

Edward fled from the cave without so much as a backward glance. Mars sighed again, walking out of the cave onto the hillside, taking in a deep breath of the fresh air outside. As he slowly breathed out, Mars started down the hill, apparently not caring that he was shirtless, that it was cold, and that the wound in his lower back was growing septic.

Amy stared after Mars, her eyes and jaw wide open in silent shock. She slowly looked downwards, scanning over her notes.

"This is turning into more than just a news story…" she muttered to herself.

* * *

 **Next Chapter:** Edward and his two associates form their own little group to combat Kevin, Pumpinator and Dial Bolic. Kevin prepares to leave HQ with Pumpinator and Dial Bolic to commence an attack on the IWF, but he is side-tracked one last time before he leaves when he has an untimely run-in with Doomsmane and Mars that ends with an unusual twist. **Chapter 10 – The Anarchists**.


	10. The Anarchists

**A/N:** I make rather a lot of assumptions in this chapter. First of all, I assume Doomsmane has five fingers in the same formation as a human's. Secondly, I make the claim that Doomsmane can breathe fire like a real dragon.

Am I taking a shot at Justin Timberlake? You decide…

 **Recap:** In that famous scene on the spiked log, Mars saved Kevin's life in return for the secret of the Butt Buster, which resulted in Mars gaining another lifelong scar, and Edward trying to take advantage of Mars's weakness, creating even more animosity between Kevin Mask and Mars.

* * *

 **Chapter 10 – The Anarchists**

"Well done, Kevin," Pumpinator greeted Kevin, slapping him on the shoulder as he joined them by the wall of the cave,

"Ow," Kevin groaned, reaching a hand to the shoulder Pumpinator had slapped.

"Hey, I didn't hit you that hard!" Punpinator laughed.

"No, but I think I may have injured that shoulder yesterday," Kevin muttered, pressing the fingers of his left hand into his painful right shoulder experimentally.

"We should be making plans for how we will destroy the Muscle League," Dial Bolic rasped, clenching his hands into fists by his face.

"Yeah Kev, are you ready for this?" Pumpinator added, turning to Kevin expectantly.

"As ready as I ever will be," Kevin confirmed, nodding his head. "Let's go."

Kevin pulled on his large overcoat, tugging the collar up around his neck as though trying to hide his face, an action really unnecessary when he wore his trusty iron mask as always. Behind him, Pumpinator turned to Dial Bolic, shrugging his shoulders in confusion.

"Hey Kev!" he yelled after Kevin. "Don't you wanna maybe pack a bag? We probably won't be comin' back here, and even if we did, that bastard scarface will probably steal all your stuff anyways!"

"Let him have it," Kevin called over his shoulder. "I have my bike, and that is all I really need in this crazy world."

Pumpinator turned to Dial Bolic again, tapping a finger against his temple.

"Damn Mask family are all nuts, I tell ya," he muttered.

Dial Bolic nodded his understanding, grabbing up his own bag of personal belongings. The two nodded at each other, hoisting their bags over their shoulders and then started after their third team member, their self-appointed leader, Kevin Mask, recent graduate of The Academy.

* * *

Mars stepped back into the corner of the ring, smirking to himself as he watched Kevin Mask walk away, followed closely by Pumpinator and Dial Bolic. Chuckling to himself and shaking his head, Mars leaned back, resting his back against the corner-post and propping his elbows up on the ropes protruding from either side of it.

"Band o' freaks," he muttered to himself once the trio had disappeared from his line of sight.

Looking around himself, Mars could only see Doomsmane and Skulldozer standing by the ring. He knew only too well that the shadowy recesses of the cave walls were lined with lower-ranking DMP trainees and Legend Devil Chojin alike, all of whom would be keen to see the latest students sit their final exam. Kevin Mask had, of course, graduated effortlessly, after defeating the standard opponents for a finalist: a trainee and a Legend. Kevin had fought against Checkmate and his trainer DMP Legend Sunshine simultaneously, as was the requirement, and surprised all those in attendance by not only winning the match in a remarkably short space of time, but also by winning the match with grace and dignity, without maiming or killing either of his opponents.

"He values honour above all else, that boy," Doomsmane said with a sigh. "He'll never last in the DMP."

"Hey lizardboy!" Mars yelled across to the dragon Chojin. "Quit yappin' and send in my opponents already!"

Doomsmane slowly lifted his eyes from the clipboard he held in one clawed hand, eying Mars over with a degree of displeasure.

"As you wish, scarface," he slowly replied. "But since this is your third attempt to graduate from The Academy, we have prepared something very special for you here today."

"Oh yeah?" Mars drawled. "Bring it on!"

"Indeed," Doomsmane patiently continued. "Instead of pitting you against a team of two wrestlers, one trainee and one Legend, we decided that, under the circumstances, it was far more appropriate to choose one trainee and, instead of a Legend, a further two trainees, to test your skill."

"I'm fightin' three trainees?"

Mars pushed himself off the corner-post, slowly sauntering over to the side of the ring Doomsmane and Skulldozer stood at.

"A move in your favour, I'm sure," Doomsmane sarcastically replied, his eyes still fixed on the clipboard in his hand.

"Dis match will be over in seconds," Mars growled. "Send da little bastards in."

"With pleasure."

Doomsmane lifted his head from the clipboard, his eyes moving to something past and beyond Mars. He stretched out one arm, opening out his gnarled, scaly fingers. Mars turned his head to look over his shoulder, groaning at what he saw.

"No…" he grumbled, closing his eyes and shaking his head.

With a sigh of despair, Mars slowly turned around, facing the young DMP trainee standing on the ring apron, grasping the top rope on one hand and staring across the ring at Mars with narrowed, glowing green eyed.

"Well, well, if it ain't little Eddie Mask," Mars greeted him.

"That's right, scarface," Edward spat, climbing through the ropes. "And Doomsmane told me I could choose my own partner for this match. He said I should choose a Legend, but I managed to convince him that I would rather fight alongside my team-mates, and so he let me choose two fellow trainees in place of one Legend."

"So I gotta fight you and your two little friends," Mars groaned, rolling his eyes. "Like I ain't never done dat before."

Edward began to laugh at Mars, momentarily catching Mars off-guard. Why, Mars wondered, was Edward so confident? Mars had always managed to defeat Edward and his friends with ease, why should an official match against the trio be any different?

Mars cleared his throat, straightening his back and stretching to his fullest height to hide the flicker of doubt in his mind. Edward, he decided, was just bluffing after all. The boy had shown signs of being mentally unstable in the past, and obviously right now, after the events of the previous day, he was still a little wound up. Mars forced a confident smile as two silhouetted figures approached the ring. This, he told himself, was going to be even easier than he thought. This time there was no way Doomsmane could possibly fail him. In a matter of minutes, Mars would be graduating from The Academy at long last.

Edward eventually stopped his maniacal laughter as his two friends climbed into the ring, taking their positions at either side of him. Mars scanned his way along the three trainee Devil Chojins before turning his head to look over one shoulder at Doomsmane.

"Ring da bell already, I'm itchin' to kick dis off," he ordered.

"Certainly," Doomsmane replied, picking up the gavel and approaching the ringbell.

Doomsmane held the small hammer above the bell as if about to strike it, only to stop short.

"Oh, scarface my dear boy, there is just one more thing I really should tell you about this match before we begin," he said slowly. "One more small difference between this match and every other final exam match you have ever fought in that I really feel I should draw your attention to."

"Oh yeah?" Mars pressed impatiently.

"Oh yes," Doomsmane replied through a smile. "If you lay so much as one finger on Edward Mask, you will be failed instantly. Good luck, scarface."

"What?" Mars roared.

But before Mars could argue the point, Doomsmane sounded the bell, and Edward's two friends raced towards him. Mars hesitated, his mind racing as he tried to think of exactly how he could possibly defeat Edward if he could not even touch him. Mars's moment of weakness cost him dearly, as each of Edward's friends attached themselves to one of Mars's arms, pulling him back and tying his arms up into the ring ropes.

At first, Mars was more concerned with the fact that Edward was laughing like a madman again, but as his arms were pulled through the ropes, the jagged barbed wire tore into the thinner material of his bodysuit, drawing blood from his upper arms. Mars turned to look at each of his arms, gasping as he saw that he was completely ensnared in the ropes. The armguards he wore over his forearms had protected the lower part of his arms from injury, but they had also made him unaware of the extent of which he had been wrapped up into the wires. Mars tried to move his hands, but only succeeded in catching his knuckles against the barbed wire, drawing yet more blood.

"I'm really going to enjoy this…" Edward said, his voice sounding suddenly much closer.

Mars turned to face him, lifting one foot in an attempt to kick Edward away.

"Ah-ah, if you touch me, you fail, remember?" Edward warned, leaning over him.

"Get away from me!" Mars yelled.

"You owe me a kiss, Mars" Edward hissed.

Mars rapidly turned his head from side to side, pressing his back against the ropes as he tried to put as much distance as possible between himself and Edward.

"You can't join the ranks of the DMP until you kiss me, scarface!" Edward snapped irritably.

Mars paused, his face creasing as an idea occurred to him.

"Well hey, ya know what?" he said, turning to face Edward, smirking confidently. "I don't wanna join da ranks of da DMP. I don't wanna be just another brick in da wall like all of yous is. I wanna be da leader. I wanna be da head man of da DMP. And everybody knows dat da leader ain't da man who follows da rules, he's da man who breaks 'em."

"What?" Edward echoed nervously.

"I always did say I could still kick all your asses even wid both my arms tied behind my back!" Mars laughed.

Mars jumped up and kicked out with both feet, kicking his heels into Edward's chest and sending his body flying to the other side of the ring. Behind him Doomsmane rang the bell, yelling out that Mars was disqualified and that he had failed for a third time to successfully graduate from The Academy.

"Well I guess if I'm disqualified and I've failed already, I ain't got nothin' more to lose!" Mars cheerfully said, leaning forwards and pulling his arms around.

Edward's two friends helped him to his feet and all three watched in stunned awe as Mars pulled his tangled arms round, slowly snapping the wire ring ropes from the posts. They watched as Mars untied himself and then grabbed up the remains of the barbed wire, oblivious to the injuries he was inflicting upon himself as he began to bend the wire into a series of shapes.

"I don't like the look of this…" Edward muttered. "Doomsmane? Skulldozer?"

Mars blinked at Edward, before looking over each of his shoulders.

"Heh, looks like it's just you boys and me," he remarked as he saw that the two Legends had disappeared.

"We're not boys!" one of Edward's friends yelled defiantly. "We are the team who will defeat the Muscle League!"

"I thought dat was Kevin Mask's team dat was gonna defeat da Muscle League?" Mars returned.

"But we will are the team who will defeat Kevin Mask's team!" Edward argued back. "We are the team born of hatred, the team who dare to defy the rules, the team who–"

"Da team who have some major issues," Mars cut in. "Do me a favour Eddie. Step outta your big brother's shadow and go do somethin' for yourself, yeah?"

"I have done something for myself, Mars!" Edward retorted. "I have formed a wrestling faction the likes of which no-one has ever seen before! I was trying to tell you about it, but you interrupted me!"

"Oh I'm sorry. Please, do go on. I do enjoy a good joke."

"We are no joke! We will destroy the Muscle League and we will destroy Kevin Mask and his friends. And then we will destroy the Legends of the Muscle League. I am going to challenge my father to a fight to the death!"

"You're gonna do what now?"

"I hate Robin Mask and I hate everything he stands for! Ever since he got that knighthood from the queen of England, he changed. He thought he was so special when he became "Sir" Robin Mask! Well, do you know what? I hate "Sir" Robin Mask, and I hate the queen! The queen represents everything my father ever stood for! He fought for her, and his royalist views drove me to the ends of my sanity! Which is why I swore to follow the path of anarchy. It is why we are The Anarchists!"

"I see…"

Mars slowly nodded his head, pulling a face of mock interest.

"Okay, now dat's all cleared up, I'ma get you all," Mars bluntly said. "I'll be da wrestler who goes down in history for destroyin' a new faction in da shortest period of time ever. Da day Da anarchists was formed, Mars obliterated 'em…"

Mars tugged at the barbed wire, grinning maliciously. He pulled down his golden visor, activating his Mask of Madness, and began to stalk towards the three trainees before him.

"Run!" Edward yelled.

* * *

Amy sighed, holding up her notebook and scanning through the writing scribbled across the pages. Although she had written all those notes with her own hand, the letters were barely legible to her own eye; so much had happened, she had tried so hard to write it all down in such a short space of time.

But, Amy thought to herself, she had done a good job of capturing everything that she had witnessed in her time skulking around in the shadows of the DMP headquarters. She had uncovered a fantastic story. A story of intrigue, mystery, drama, action, betrayal, hatred, passion, lust, vengeance, wrath, ambition, pain and suspense. A story any news station the world over would pay millions for. A story that she herself had played a role in. A story that had become a part of her life.

Amy slowly turned on a few pages, stopping at the section entitled "Mars". Mars's story had been fascinating, and she prided herself on how she had pieced it together from snippets of heartfelt confessions Mars had spontaneously made when either drunk or stoned.

Mars was an Accipiter Sapiens, or birdman. Although Amy had heard of the Accipiter Sapiens race, she had never actually seen a birdperson, and so had always thought them to be a mythical being. The Accipiter Sapiens were renowned to be a peaceful race, a religious race who valued honour above all qualities, a race who lived a secluded existence, their rigid morals and high values making them outcasts in human society, where disorder and diversity ran rife.

Mars, it seemed, had been a rebel. Rebelling against his strict upbringing, he had run away from home at an early age to join the DMP, an act apparently done in direct defiance of his family. An act he lived to regret, since Doomsmane had scarred his face to show his dishonour to all the world, to prevent him from ever returning to his family, to his people.

Mars always seemed confident to the point of arrogance; but he lived a lonely existence, hidden in his little cave at the top end of the DMP headquarters, segregated from the other Devil Chojins in more than just distance.

Mars's story was a brilliant one, but it was not Amy's favourite; Kevin Mask's story was the one that really stood out in her mind.

Raised by a domineering father who worked him impossibly hard in both his studies and his physical training, Kevin's only solace as a youth had been in the company of his kind, caring and doting mother. But Kevin had lost his mother by the most terrible means imaginable, and consequently had always blamed himself for her death. After Alice Mask died, the only company Kevin had left was that of his younger brother Edward.

Edward had disappeared from Kevin's life the day he was "kidnapped" by Mars, and Kevin had almost gone mad thereafter in the company of only Robin Mask and Warsman. Kevin had run away from home in search of friends and fun, but had ended up turning to drink and venting his anger in vicious street fights.

Of course, Kevin had then met up with Devil Chojins Pumpinator and Dial Bolic, who had taken him back to the DMP headquarters to commence his training, where Kevin had met Mars, and been reunited with his long lost baby brother Edward.

After learning that little brother Edward was a bitter, twisted, weak and miserable young man, Kevin had only suffered further anguish when he had learned that Edward was also harbouring feelings for Mars, and his mind was tortured by the lingering question of just how far Edward's affections had taken his relationship with the Accipiter Sapiens.

"Poor Kevin, he's just misunderstood," Amy sighed, holding up her notebook again. "All he really wants and needs is a good friend, someone to confide in, someone he can really trust and depend upon."

Amy paused, suddenly aware that it had gotten much darker in the late evening light, so dark that her eyes were straining to read the already barely-legible text in front of her. Amy gulped hard as a sickening thought curdled inside her mind. Around her the grassy hillside was still illuminated by the sinking sun, the sudden darkness being concentrated over and immediately around her. Amy reluctantly came to the conclusion that she was no longer alone on the hillside.

"Mars?" she asked weakly. "Kevin?"

"Guess again," a clipped, deep voice replied.

Amy started to turn her head to look over her shoulder, her breath catching in her throat as a wall of flame passed in front of her face, igniting the notebook in her hand. As the flames faded in front of her face, leaving only black smoke and a heat haze in the air, Amy turned to her hand, screaming as she saw the charred remains of her weeks of note-taking smouldering into black ash between her fingers.

Amy dropped what little was left of her precious notebook, leaping up and scrambling away from the menace behind her as fast as she possibly could.

"Oh no you don't," the voice growled.

A bony, clawed hand grabbed Amy's shoulder from behind, yanking her around with such force, she spun on the spot, before falling back down to the ground, facing the giant shadow that threatened her.

"Wh-what the hell are you?" she squealed, her eyes doubling in size as she glanced nervously over the giant humanoid lizard standing over her.

"Your worst nightmare, you stupid little girl!" the dragon snarled. "I am a Devil Chojin, a Legend of the DMP, my name is Doomsmane, and it is my responsibility to deal with anyone who dares to approach our sacred lair. Either you are here to join us, or you are here to die. Which is it, girl?"

Amy shuffled back, hissing as one of her wrists clattered painfully into a rock.

"I assume then that you wish to die," Doomsmane concluded. "But I'm not so heartless that I would strike my prey while it is down, especially not when it is nothing more than a ridiculous little slip of a girl. Give me at least some fun, little girl. Try to run away from me. Go on, make me laugh before I drink your blood and serve your pickled bones for breakfast!"

Amy quickly got to her feet, readying herself to turn away from Doomsmane and run for her life; but like the vile, immoral being that he was, Doomsmane did not even allow Amy the chance of escape that he had just promised her. No sooner had she gotten to her feet than he swiped a clawed hand at her face. His long, sharp, ragged talons tore into Amy's skin, spraying blood through the air. The force of the blow knocked Amy to the ground, where she landed awkwardly on one arm, her head pulsing and spinning as blood pumped out of the deep gashes over her face.

Amy slowly reached a quivering hand to her face, touching the tip of her nose before quickly snatching back her hand as she felt a stream of hot, fresh blood slip down her fingers. Amy looked down at the lines of blood on her hand, silently hoping that the monster killed her quickly, as his attacks were painful beyond belief. She closed her fist around the blood, which was beginning to dry onto her skin already, and slowly turned to face the dragon.

Amy whimpered involuntarily as she watched Doomsmane slowly and methodically lick her blood from the underside of each of his claws in turn, making small noises of delight as he did so. Once he was done, he smiled dreamily, slowly lowering his eyes to Amy's.

"And now girl, you die," he said slowly. "I think I shall just eat you alive. The only thing more succulent than fresh meat is fresh live meat…"

Amy screamed as the dragon fell ungracefully towards her. She quickly rolled over to one side, watching in a state of horrified intrigue as Doomsmane fell hard to the ground where she had been lying only moments ago, a dark shape attached to his back.

"What are you waiting for, get the hell out of here!" a voice yelled at her.

Amy frowned at the dark shape, squinting as she saw the distinct shape of two legs at one end of it. Recognising that someone had come to her rescue, she hurriedly nodded her understanding, pushing herself up to her feet. She turned and started to run away, only to stagger to a halt.

"I can't do this," she muttered to herself.

Amy turned back to the ensuing fight behind her, watching as the dragon and her saviour rolled over and over each other, rolling down the side of the hill. In the increasing darkness caused by the onslaught of nightfall, combined with the dizzying effects of the painful blow she had taken to the face, Amy's eyes were straining to make anything out. Images and shapes moved in and out of darkness, blurred in and out of proportion, and nothing seemed to make any sense to her any more.

A cold, sickening sweat prickled through Amy's skin, cooling her as a sudden gust of wind swept past her. She shivered involuntarily, cries of pain catching in her ears from the fight scene below her. Whoever it was that was grappling with the dragon was only doing so because of her. Whoever, or indeed whatever, it was, this person was in great danger, and it was all because of her.

Amy quickly looked about herself, clasping a hand to her forehead as the movement of looking downwards caused fresh spurts of thick blood to pump down over one side of her face, leaving her feeling even more light-headed than before. In her confused, dazed and barely conscious state, Amy grabbed up a thick stick from the ground at her feet and started down the hill.

Along the way, Amy stumbled around and over various foreign objects, most of which she vaguely recognised as items of clothing. She did not stop to confirm what any of them were, instead running on until she caught up with Doomsmane, who was getting to his feet as she reached him.

"Leave him alone, you bastard!" she yelled, swinging the stick at the dragon's head.

Amy managed to smack Doomsmane over the skull with the stick with a satisfying thud, unfortunately doing little more than arousing his anger. Doomsmane snarled angrily, snorting smoke out through his nostrils. He spun around to face her, his face looking positively demonic as smoke continued to curl out of his nostrils. He opened his mouth, a swirl of orange flames gathering in the back of his throat. Amy yelped, thrusting her hand towards his mouth and lodging the stick between his jaws.

Amy staggered back, watching fearfully as Doomsmane tried to shut his mouth. He wretched in confusion, clawing his hands into his mouth in a desperate attempt to dislodge the stick that had become firmly rooted between his tongue and the roof of his mouth. With his tongue pinned down hard, Doomsmane had little control over the situation, and an ungraceful line of sliver slid over his bottom lip, hanging down from one corner of his mouth.

Amy screamed, falling back into a sitting position as Doomsmane suddenly became air-bourn; he could fly? Doomsmane's body floated in the air for a moment before shooting to one side and landing hard by a ledge on the hillside. The dragon struggled there for a brief moment, still clawing angrily at the stick in his mouth, before rolling off the edge and plummeting down the steep drop.

Amy sighed in relief, flopping onto her back and spreading out her arms and legs out at her sides. As she looked up at the sky, the colours of the sunset, the clouds, the moon, the small hints of stars and the sky itself all began to blur and spin. The wound on her face was pulsating, and her body was fighting hard to heal itself. She touched a hand to her jaw, groaning as she felt the stickiness of her own congealing blood.

Amy slowly moved her hand upwards, closing her eyes as she gingerly touched her fingers to various parts of her face. She could feel four distinct tears in her skin, although two were only minor, and one was nothing more than deep cut. Doomsmane's index finger had left a small laceration along Amy's forehead that started just above the bridge of her nose and came down through the middle of her left eyebrow. His middle finger, being his longest finger, had left the deepest gash, which began just below the bridge of her nose, ran down the left side of her nose to her cheekbone and down almost to her jawline. Doomsmane's third finger had left two deep cuts, one near the tip of her nose that ran parallel to the gash his middle claw had made, and another cut halfway down her cheek. Doomsmane's smallest finger had left a minor laceration, but one that ran from Amy's upper lip, over her lower lip and down to one side of her chin.

Amy opened her eyes, inhaling sharply in fear as a leathery hand clamped around her wrist and lifted her hand from her wounds.

"Don't poke at them, you'll only make them worse," a voice quietly scolded her.

"Wh-who are you?" she asked, squinting against her dizziness and the increasing darkness at the shadow hanging over her.

"It's probably best that I don't answer that question right now," the voice replied. "We need to get you some help. Come with me."

"I don't think I can walk," Amy protested.

"You won't have to."

Amy opened her mouth to argue again, but her words were cut off as an arm reached around the backs of her knees and another around her waist. Amy yelped as she was hoisted off the ground, grabbing a handful of the ragged pink material by her chest.

In her dazed state, Amy was beginning to question all manner of things that she would, under normal circumstances, accept for what they were; but the most pressing thought in her mind revolved around the overwhelming feeling of foreboding she could sense emanating from the man carrying her up the hillside. Amy looked down at her hands, opening them out to inspect the torn and blood-soaked remains of the dull pink T-shirt the man wore.

"You saved my life," she said frankly, her voice sounding fuzzy in her own ears.

The man did not answer her, and so Amy moved her eyes upwards slightly, stopping as she caught sight of a chunk of ash blonde hair. She cautiously touched her fingers to it, narrowing her eyes at it suspiciously.

"You saved my life," she said again, looking upwards until she found the man's face.

Again, he ignored her. Amy tilted her head to one side, studying him carefully. He had smooth, chiselled features, long blonde hair and determined blue eyes. And apparently he had a halo. Amy reached a hand up towards his head, causing him to look sharply down at her with a scowl of displeasure.

"Stay still," he grumbled.

"You have long blonde hair, blue eyes and a big halo," she told him. "You must be an angel. And I must be dead. You didn't save my life, you came to take my soul to heaven."

"Halo?" he muttered, stopping short. "What the devil are you talking about?"

He turned his head upwards, sighing at what he saw.

"That's the moon, you idiot," he pointed out, before walking on. "You're just seeing the glow of the full moon behind my head, now shut-up and stay still."

"Am I dead? Is this heaven?"

"No and no."

"I thought heaven would be more… Cloudlike."

"This isn't heaven. Far from it."

"Then I'm still alive?"

"Can you feel any pain?"

"Yes."

"Then you're still alive."

"But you are my angel? You must be my guardian angel, you saved my life."

"Oh shut-up already."

Amy's eyesight blurred, a grey cloud passing over the shapes around her, before she finally passed out completely. Her rescuer gently laid her down on the moss by the entrance to Mars's cave, sliding his arms out from under her. He frowned down at her still and silent form for a moment before poking her in the ribs with one experimental finger.

"Are you dead?" he asked her.

When she did not answer he pulled off one glove, touching his bared fingers to her neck. When he was certain he could still feel a pulse he stood up, sighing and shaking his head.

"Stupid girl," he grumbled. "Now what am I meant to do with you?"

Just then a third figure joined them as Mars staggered into his cave from within the DMP headquarters. He chuckled to himself quietly, muttering something under his breath about being the new leader of the DMP, before skidding a halt and staring silently at the figures by the mouth of his cave.

"Hey, what da hell's goin' on here?" he demanded, marching out onto the hillside.

Mars glanced between the man standing at one side of the cave and the girl lying at the other.

"Hey, I know her!" he eventually said. "Dat's da obnoxious girl from High Park Ladies Club wid a face like a horse. Her name's Julie."

"Her name's Amy, you miserable buffoon," the man next to him growled.

"Is she your girlfriend?" Mars asked, turning to eye over the man. "She don't look too good, maybe you oughta get her to a doctor, or somethin', yeah?"

"Doomsmane did this to her," the man calmly replied.

"Doomsmane?" Mars echoed, turning back to Amy. "Shit, dat ain't good. Did he get to you too?"

Mars pointed his finger at the various tears in the man's clothing and the selection of lacerations and burns over the bared parts of his body.

"I'm fine," the man calmly replied. "But I will need your help. Doomsmane did to her face what he did to yours. You lived, but you are a superhuman. Will she die?"

"Hey, how do you know Doomsmane did dis?" Mars asked suspiciously, touching a hand to his scars.

"Because you told me, you daft git."

"Hey, back off wid da insults! Do you want me to help you or not?"

"Will she live?"

"She should do. But she ain't gonna look too pretty. She'll be scarred forever."

"Alright. I'm going to take her to a hospital. But I can't do it like this. Doomsmane tore off some of my clothing, would you be good enough to retrieve my belongings for me if I stay here with the girl? You understand I'm only asking you to do this for the sake of the girl. She's a bit disoriented and distressed, she needs someone to stay with her, and I think she prefers me to you."

"I'ma help you out dis time pal, but only because it's for a lady, understand?"

"Yes."

"But you gotta get outta here pretty damn fast. Do you even know where you are?"

"I'm standing outside your poxy little bedroom, Mars."

"Hey, how do you know my name?"

The man sighed, rolling his eyes in despair. He began to rip the remains of his tattered and torn T-shirt from his body, causing Mars to take a step back from him, his eyes widening worriedly.

"Hey, what cha doin' now?" Mars demanded.

"I find it hard to believe that you could forget me so quickly, scarface," the man grumbled, dropping his T-shirt to the ground and turning his back on Mars.

Mars frowned, running his eyes over the tattooed images over the man's back. It looked like a giant spiderweb, littered with small human bodies.

"Hey, Kevin Mask had a tattoo just like dat, pal," Mars told him.

The man snarled in frustration, spinning around to face Mars again.

"I am Kevin Mask, you bloody idiot!" he yelled into Mars's face. "Now will you please get me my coat and my mask so that I can take this interfering little bitch of a girl to a hospital! The sooner I get this out of the way, the sooner I can go back to my plan of destroying the Muscle League, understand?"

"Squealer?" Mars said slowly, the corners of his mouth curling into his cheeks to form a mischievous grin. "I never knew you was a pretty boy."

"Just shut-up and get me my mask!" Kevin snapped irritably.

"Sure, I'ma help you out dis time, squealer," Mars replied, nodding his head.

"Thank you, scarface," Kevin sneered.

"You're welcome," Mars replied, stepping over Amy and starting down the hillside. "Although…"

"Oh God…" Kevin grumbled, dragging his ungloved hand down his face as Mars stopped and turned back to face him.

"You do remind me of someone now dat I see your face…" Mars said slowly, waving a finger at Kevin.

"Edward?" Kevin suggested. "My father?"

"No, it ain't a wrestler," Mars replied, shaking his head. "It's some dude I saw on TV one time…"

"Mars, please, the girl is suffering here."

"Sure, I'm on da case."

Kevin watched Mars walk on down the hill, sighing in relief that he had finally gotten rid of him.

"The amount of trouble you have caused me, Amy…" he grumbled, turning back to the unconscious girl at his feet.

Kevin slowly lowered himself to his knees at her side, removing his other glove. He began to gingerly pick her hair out of the wounds on her face, stopping abruptly when she groaned and began to stir.

"Amy?" he whispered.

"Angel?" she moaned, her eyes fluttering open.

She looked directly at Kevin, blinking several times before her eyes focussed. She smiled at him brightly, reaching a hand up to his face.

"My angel…" she said dreamily.

"I'm no angel, Amy," Kevin warned her.

"You were watching over me," Amy replied.

"No, I just happened upon you," Kevin quickly pointed out.

"Then you must happen upon me more often."

Kevin gulped nervously as she reached a hand into her jean pocket, pulling out a small card and a pen.

"What are you doing?" he asked her.

"I'm not letting you get away that easily!" she laughed.

"You're not well!" Kevin insisted as she began to scrawl something on the card with her pen. "You're delirious with pain! You don't know what you're doing!"

"Keep this, angel," she whispered, pressing the card against Kevin's chest.

Kevin slowly reached a hand to Amy's, taking the card from her. She let her hand drop back down to her side, smiling gormlessly up at Kevin as he pulled the card back to read it.

"Call me my angel," he read aloud.

Kevin frowned at Amy, turning the card over to inspect the other side.

"A friend of mine is an art student," she explained. "She made me some business cards just… Just for laughs… You will call me, won't you, Angel?"

Kevin's eyebrows shot up as he saw that the other side of the card was printed with the name "Amy MacLeod" and a telephone number.

"Amy MacLeod," he said slowly, lifting his eyes to hers.

"I think I love you," she replied, pushing herself up onto her elbows.

"Careful, you're hurt!" he said, shoving her card into his pocket and reaching his hands out to catch her in case she fell back down.

"Angel…" she whispered, lifting one hand up to Kevin's face.

Kevin froze as she slowly dragged the tip of one finger down one side of his face. Amy moved her hand down to Kevin's neck, sliding her fingers up through the hair at the back of his head. Kevin instinctively moved his hands closer together, taking hold of either side of her waist. At the contact, she sat up further, moving her face closer to his. Before he could stop himself, Kevin closed the gap between them, catching her lips in a kiss. She let out a small sound in the back of her throat and he moved back, cursing himself inwardly as he saw that he had just successfully reopened the cut over her lips.

"It's okay," she assured him, touching her other hand to his cheek and smoothing her thumb over his lips. "It's okay."

Kevin and Amy moved towards each other again and began to kiss each other. Kevin moved his hands up her back, pulling her closer to him and leaning over her. Amy clawed her fingers into his scalp, sending a shiver of pleasure down his spine. Kevin began to lose his inhibitions, gripping her tighter and deepening their kiss. Amy dragged one hand down the back of his neck, her fingernails catching on the skin at the base of his neck.

Kevin growled and Amy moaned, and both pulled the other closer, their kissing becoming more frantic. But a sudden clanging sound at their side made them separate abruptly. Both looked up, seeing Mars standing over them, a large overcoat hanging from one hand.

"Oh fuck," Kevin groaned.

Amy slowly lowered her eyes to the source of the clanging sound, finding a large blue iron mask lying open on the ground by her side.

"Hey, isn't that Kevin Mask's mask?" she asked, pulling one hand from Kevin to pick it up.

"Yes, it is mine," Kevin quietly replied.

Amy paused, the mask hanging from her fingers. She slowly lifted her dark eyes from the mask to Kevin's face, the realisation of her situation slowly dawning on her.

"Kevin?" she said in a choked voice. "Kevin Mask?"

"Yes, I'm afraid so," Kevin quietly replied.

"But…"

Amy looked down at the mask again, and then up at Kevin.

"You lied to me!" she yelled, gripping into his mask. "You told me you were my angel!"

"I never said that!" Kevin protested.

"You never denied it!"

"What?"

"You lying, sick, fucking bastard!"

Amy swung her hand towards Kevin, smacking his mask into his face. He grunted in shock, falling back onto one hand. Amy struggled towards him but he quickly got to his feet, turning to Mars.

"You complete and utter bastard, Mars!" he roared.

"You're welcome, Mask," Mars replied with a smug grin.

"You're the utter bastard, Kevin Mask!" Amy yelled, swinging Kevin's mask at his face again. "I hate you! I hope you burn in hell, you… You…"

Amy swayed on the spot for a moment before her eyes rolled back into her head and she began to collapse. Kevin quickly reached out both arms, catching her limp form as she dropped his mask to the ground with another clang. He sighed in relief, before turning to Mars, who was whistling a tuneless ditty as he casually admired his fingernails.

"Take her to a hospital, Mars," he said quietly. "I can't do it, she hates me. Just be gentle with her, alright?"

"Sure, Mask," Mars sighed. "You don't mind if I have sex wid her first, right?"

"What?" Kevin roared. "You sick bastard, she's unconscious!"

"Yeah?" Mars replied, shrugging his shoulders. "Dis way she can't say no."

"What?" Kevin yelped. "Look, never mind, you obviously can't be trusted. I'll just have to take her there myself. Honestly, I can't rely on you for anything!"

"You can rely on me beatin' your ass in da ring."

"I'd like to see you try,"

"I will one day, Mask."

"I look forward to it."

"Me too."

"Then we truly will know who the better wrestler, and indeed who the better man, is!"

"We already know I'm da better man, but I'd like to prove dat I'm also da better wrestler."

"It's a deal. I'll see you after I've dealt with the Muscle League."

"You're on."

Kevin lowered Amy to the ground and retrieved his mask, pulling it on and closing it into place around his head. Mars threw Kevin's coat to him, which Kevin caught midair and roughly pulled on, closing it over his bare upper body.

"Until we meet again, scarface," he growled, grabbing Amy up and throwing her over his shoulder.

"Until we meet again, squealer," Mars replied, saluting Kevin.

Kevin turned his back on Mars and marched off down the hillside with Amy.

"I rather suspect that I stand as much chance of seeing him again as I do of seeing you, Miss MacLeod," Kevin muttered to himself. "That man will never amount to anything, I swear."

Back at the mouth of the cave, Mars smiled to himself, clicking his fingers as he was suddenly hit by the solution the question that had been nagging at the back of his mind.

"It's dat kid from da Mickey Mouse Club!" he muttered to himself. "He looks just like dat little blonde one, Nick Hasler!"

* * *

 **Next Chapter:** Forward in time, Kevin Mask wakes up the morning after the final match of the Ikeman Chojin Crown and reflects on just how Jacqueline McMadd got her hands on the information about his time at the DMP. **Chapter 11 – Scarface**.

 **A/N(2):** WARNING, the next chapter does contain a certain degree of spoilers for _The Reason_ for anyone who has not read as far as the final match of the Chojin Crown. It may also make you want to hit me with a very, very big stick. You have been warned.


	11. Scarface

**A/N:** Last chapter folks, and it is an irksome, if rather short, ordeal. Anyone who has read this fic and has not read _The Reason_ will now be reading spoilers, and may also now want to check out my other work to fill in the gaps. Talk about a cheap excuse to advertise my own work…

 **Recap:** Kevin graduated from The Academy, Edward formed The Anarchists, Mars failed to graduate, Doomsmane attacked Amy, who was rescued by Kevin, who was then forced to seek aid from Mars, Kevin, Pumpinator and Dial Bolic set off to confront the IWF leaving Mars, The Anarchists and Amy MacLeod far behind them.

* * *

 **Chapter 11 – Scarface**

Kevin Mask rolled onto his back, slowly and reluctantly opening his eyes. In those precious moments between the unconscious world of his dreams and the conscious world of reality, Kevin felt himself groan inwardly as the events of the previous day began rushing though his mind.

It was over. All over. Already. His first Chojin Crown tournament, the first "Ikeman Chojin Crown" tournament – or the "Jacqueline McMadd Chojin Crown, depending on how one viewed it – over already.

Kevin slapped a hand onto his forehead, closing his eyes and screwing up his features as he dragged his hand down over his face. Lord Flash had proved that he was not really Lord Flash, but rather Muscle League Legend Chojin Warsman. And, most frustratingly of all for Kevin, Warsman had only agreed to train Kevin because it was an order from Sir Robin Mask himself; the old Legend was so determined to see the Mask family name headline an IWF event, he had made his old friend dress up in a ridiculous disguise and pose under a barely believable pseudonym in order to prime the eldest Mask son for victory.

Kevin dropped his hand back to his side, sighing as he stared up at the roof above him. He was still struggling to come to terms with the outcome of the Chojin Crown tournament. When he had first heard about the tournament, he never could have imagined it would have come to this; he especially had not expected to be facing one of his oldest and longest standing rivals in the final match, a man he was almost certain he had seen the last of after the Generation Ex tournament.

Kevin clawed his sheets off his chest, sitting up with another groan. He ached all over, and even without looking at himself he knew only too well that he was still bruised and battered all over from his match. In particular, the vicious gash down his left side had grown tight and painful. It had been hurriedly stitched shut the day before, but the skin around the wound had swollen around the stitches, stretching them out and only adding to Kevin's agonies.

In all reality, Kevin should have been spending the night in a hospital bed, not his own hotel room; but he had refused to stay in the hospital, mainly because it meant sharing a ward with Mars, but also because it meant being visited by Warsman and his father, neither of whom he was quite ready to confront just yet; especially given the effect the outcome of his match would inevitably have on both his father and the android. After much disagreement on all sides, the medical experts at the hospital had eventually agreed to let Kevin go to his hotel, on the condition that a nurse visited him to check on him that morning.

"Nurse…" Kevin muttered to himself, grabbing up his watch and squinting at it. "It had better not be that green-haired little tease…"

Kevin smacked his watch back down onto his bedside table, pulling the sheets off of his legs and swinging them around to sit on the edge of the bed. Roughly rubbing the heels of his hands into his eyes, Kevin yawned openly, silently wishing that he had not agreed to attend a press conference later that day about his final match. He was dreading having to face the press, he was dreading having to face the McMadds, he was dreading having to face the Legends (especially his father and Warsman) and above all, he was dreading having to face Mars, who he had gone to great lengths to avoid thus far.

In Kevin's mind, there was nothing the fans of the IWF, the press, the McMadds, his father, Warsman, the Muscle League or even Mars could say to him right then that would make him feel any better, or indeed any worse, than he already did.

Kevin sighed again, pushing his unruly blonde hair back from his face, running his eyes over his bedside table. He cocked a smirk that Mars would have been proud of as he caught sight of a paperback novel with his own name on it.

" _Kevin Mask – The Reason_ ," he said in dramatic voice, grabbing a hand at the book.

As he dragged the book towards himself, it collided with something else on the table, knocking it to the floor.

"Ow!" Kevin whispered as it landed on his foot.

Kevin instantly frowned and shook his head at himself for being so childish as to cry out from such a minor injury. Looking down to see what it was that had fallen, Kevin saw his wallet lying over his right foot, laughing slightly at the irony of his predicament; as if his wallet even contained enough money to be heavy enough to actually hurt him! Kevin dropped his book onto his pillows before bending over to retrieve his wallet, which had snapped open. He closed it over, placing it next to himself on the bed.

"What the…?" he muttered, frowning down at his feet.

On the carpet, a short distance from where his wallet had opened out, laid a small white rectangle. Kevin leaned over, plucking it up curiously.

Pulling it to his face to study it, Kevin saw that it was a tattered old business card that looked as though it had been homemade. On the unprinted side of the card, someone had scrappily written the words "Call me, my Angel" in purple ink that had faded and broken up in places over time. Turning the card over to the printed side, Kevin's face dropped at what he saw. At one side of the card was a picture of a feminine anthro fox, next to which was printed a name and some contact details.

"Amy MacLeod," Kevin read aloud, his voice soft and quiet as he said the name he had almost forgotten about. "Telephone number and email address."

Kevin closed his fist around the card, looking up thoughtfully. Amy MacLeod. It had been so long since he had last seen the girl obsessed with justice, he thought he had forgotten her; but how could he forget someone so irritating, so hell-bent on making his life misery, so intent on seeing him suffer.

Slowly, Kevin turned his head towards the novel lying on his pillow. Still clutching the card in his right hand, Kevin reached over to retrieve the book in his left hand, turning it over to read through the blurb. So much was written in that book and so much had been told on television about Kevin's private affairs before he had appeared in the IWF, even as a member of the DMP, Kevin had always wondered just where the McMadds had gotten all the information from in the first place. As much as he hated all the literature and television programmes that had been made about his life, one point Kevin could never dispute was that they were always accurate to a degree that frightened him.

Kevin had thought the matter over, and had determined that only three people could have passed such information onto the McMadds, namely his former DMP cohort Checkmate, his own father Sir Robin Mask or his younger brother Edward Mask.

But of all of those three men, not one single individual had known everything that had been printed or broadcast about Kevin. Even combined, they could not have known some of the finer points presented in both the book about Kevin and the television programmes there had been.

Kevin slowly opened his fist, looking down at the business card again. Perhaps Checkmate had not known about the promise Kevin had made to his mother on her deathbed, perhaps Robin had not known about the string of criminal and dishonourable activities Kevin had partaken in during his stint in the DMP, and perhaps his brother Edward had not known about Kevin's one-time plans to seize control of the DMP, but one person had known. One person had known all of those things. One person had been there through it all, and had witnessed most of it first-hand.

"Amy MacLeod…" Kevin said softly, placing the card down at his side and taking hold of the novel in both hands.

Kevin began flicking through the book, his brow furrowed intently as he studied the pages of the book, only pausing at certain pictures as he came across them. As he failed to find what he sought, Kevin grew increasingly frustrated, eventually throwing the book at the wall in his ire. He folded his arms tightly over his chest, puffing a blast of air at the hair that had fallen over his eyes, blowing it back from obscuring his vision.

Kevin slowly stood up from the bed, wincing and hissing to himself as he hobbled across the room to the television, switching it on and scooping up the remote control. As Kevin limped back towards his bed, he heard a woman's voice behind him talking about his match the previous day, and what a shocking affair it had been. Kevin spun around and dropped back onto his bed, sitting slouched at the edge of the mattress, facing the television.

Kevin lifted the remote, aiming it at the television, his forefinger touching the surface of one button; but there he stopped. Kevin slowly lowered his hand to his thigh, falling into a numb trance as he watched replays of the key points of his match the previous day. He had never watched one of his own matches before, not even when Lord Flash had tried to make him do so. To Kevin, it had just always seemed like such an unnatural thing to do, to watch himself doing his own job.

He had never before realised just how brutal his matches could be. He had never before realised just how brutal he could be.

Kevin lifted the remote again, readying himself to change the channel, but stopped again as the replay of the move that had ended the match was acted out before his eyes in super-slow motion. As he watched the expressions on both his own exposed face and Mars's, the looks of despair and determination they each wore respectively, Kevin was suddenly unable to look away. Despite the fact that Kevin's sleep had been haunted with nightmares of that moment, that brief, instant in time, a moment that had taken little more than a few seconds to transpire, yet had felt like an eternity, like it had happened in super-slow motion, just like it was happening on the replay on the television, Kevin had to watch as the answer to the question both he and Mars had always asked themselves was finally realised.

The camera panned over to the booth the McMadds had sat in throughout the match. As Kevin watched, Vance closed his eyes and turned his head away, Ikeman screamed and ducked under the table and even the self-professed lover of all things violent, Jacqueline McMadd, fainted at what she saw. The camera then flashed to a shot of the IWF's colour commentators, Doc Nakano and Mac Metaphor, who looked about as exhausted as Kevin had felt after the match. Mac Metaphor was on his feet yelling something out through an enormous grin of delight, and at his side, Doc Nakano was wiping the sweat from his brow with a hanker-chief whilst adjusting his toupee with his other hand. Kevin's face twisted as he watched them; for two individuals who were paid very highly to be unbiased, they were certainly showing just who their favourite had been throughout the final of the Chojin Crown.

Grumbling in disgust, Kevin pointed the remote at the television again, but again he stopped. This time he was being subjected to a shot of Roxanne, Trixie and Kiki. Their facial expressions were enough to make him growl to himself in anger – they were doing nothing to hide their feelings regarding the outcome, and making it quite clear to any who may have doubted their allegiances that they were fully supporting Mars – but Kevin's attention was held as the camera slowly drew back, widening the shot to encapsulate more of the front row.

Terry Kenyon, Dik Dik Van Dik, Jaeger, Broken Junior, Kid Muscle, Meat, Marie, the Tusket family; they were all there, and they were all apparently of the same opinion: Mars was their favourite. Warsman came into view, walking away from the ring, his head hanging low. Kevin watched on in horrified fascination as his own father, Robin Mask, met Warsman halfway down the aisle, and the two walked on towards the backstage area together without so much as a backward glance at the fallout from the result of the match in the ring.

"Bastards…" Kevin grumbled, readying himself to switch the television off again.

But again Kevin saw something that captivated his attention. It was something shocking, something sickening, something disgusting, something disturbing, something so unexpected the very sight of it made Kevin drop the remote to the floor, where the batteries fell out, removing the option of changing the channel or switching the television off without first crossing the room. It was something so unbelievable, it almost seemed perfectly logical.

One side of Kevin's mouth curled into a grin; although he was not entirely sure what sort of grin it was. Only half of him saw the need to grin at anything, and even that half was not entirely sure if it felt the depth of irony of the situation, if it was amused or if it was actually happy with what it saw.

Standing at one end of the line of familiar faces that filled the front row was a tall, scrawny looking young woman, with Mars's headdress draped over one arm and Kevin's mask clutched in her other hand. She was grinning brightly up at the ring, apparently highly pleased with the result of the match she had just watched. She could have passed by the attention of most as being just another wrestling fan, and even Kevin would have overlooked her under normal circumstances; but the two deep scars that ran diagonally over her face gave her identity away.

Kevin's face dropped; those nagging, distracting insults a female voice had been screaming at him throughout the match had not come from Kiki as he had suspected. He should have known it was not Kiki, her accent was wrong, her tone far too irritating. All those taunts, all misplaced cheers, they had all come from that one scar-faced girl.

"Amy MacLeod…" Kevin muttered, narrowing his eyes at the all-too-familiar face of the girl cheering for the result of the match. "You conniving little bitch…"

* * *

 **A/N(2):** For the rest of this story, I again refer you to my other works. I should perhaps now refer back to my original claim regarding the purpose of this fic. I said this fic was a prequel to _I Want You Bad_ and a background story of Mars and Kevin's time in the DMP.

But there's more.

This fic was also my excuse to write a sequel to _The Reason._


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